Now, for future reference:
Daisuke is Tsubasa
Dark is still Dark
Satoshi is Arata and
Krad is Haruto
Nevermore
There is darkness all around, surrounding him, but he isn't scared. There is darkness all around and it is warm and made of black fathers, like wings that had decided to make a shield out of themselves.
He is aware of a presence behind him, but it's waning and slowly fading from existence.
It speaks to him:
"I'm sorry. I can't stay with you anymore."
"Please, don't leave." he answers back.
A chuckle, but he has a feeling the other's smile is a sad one. "Come and find me then, Dai." he says.
And then he's alone.
Around him is some kind of dome. There are no doors and no windows even though he desperately wants out. He is floating.
He puts a slender hand on one of the walls and finds it peels easily under his touch. He rips it off, then again and again.
He wants out.
The next time he opens his eyes, he's laying in a bed. The ceiling above him is plain and white and he doesn't know what to make of it.
When the door he hadn't noticed opens, he doesn't know what to make of that either.
Three women step in and he stares. They all have halos and wings on their backs, all white and feathery – but for some reason that doesn't bother him, what does is– is... Something isn't right with those wings, but he doesn't know what.
"Hi," one of them greets and the other two echo the word.
He does too, asking "Um, where am I? And, uh, who are you?"
"The better question is who are you?"
"What do you mean? I'm–" he pauses "Who am I?"
The black-haired one shrugs "Who knows."
"Huh? Sorry, I don't understand."
"In this world, no one knows who they were before coming here and becoming a Haibane."
His brow creases in confusion "Haibane?"
The women nod "That's what we call ourselves." the brunette with brown eyes explains. "We devise our names from the dream we had before hatching."
He is even more confused now.
"Hatching?"
The smallest one, a blond, bobs her head "Remember that big dome you were in?"
He mimics her previous action, even though he currently isn't quite sure of anything.
The raven pulls up a chair near his bed, then sits so her arms are resting on the back of it "Okay then, tell us about your dream kid."
Feeling slightly self-conscious, he begins his tale "Uh, I'm not sure. All I remember was being surrounded by some kind of darkness, but I think those were wings surrounding me... they were pitch black."
"That's quite the vague one." the brunette grumbles. The blond hushes her. The raven doesn't pay them any attention, staring and frowning at him. He squirms under the scrutiny.
The raven stands up after a while and smirks.
"Tsubasa." she says finally, crossing her arms and looking rather proud of herself.
It takes a moment for the word to register. "What?"
"Tsubasa, as in wing, do you like it?"
It doesn't sound quite right, but somehow it sounds fitting.
He nods.
If you asked him the next morning, he wouldn't have been able to tell you how he got his own pair of wings on his back. He'd remember only pain.
"Reki?" his voice is quiet and reverberates off the walls eerily. The woman turns from her post by the kitchen sink – visible from his spot on the bed – and looks at him in concern. She'd been washing bloody towels and bandages while he'd tried to get some sleep.
"Yeah, kid?" she asks.
He wants to shrink into himself, but his back hurts too much to allow him to move. "Why are my feathers still all bloody?"
The woman sighs "I think it's their natural color. It's rather unusual, huh?"
"Do you think they'll hate me?" he whispers, because all Haibane seemed to posses white wings, not ones that looked like someone had tainted them with blood. He doesn't know why the fear of being outcast seems so familiar. "Everyone has white wings, so I'm the odd one out."
Reki scowls at him, marches over to the bed and grabs his chin between her fingers, angling it so he was forced to look into her fiery, passionate eyes. "No, you're special kid. Don't forget that." she says seriously. There's no room for argument in her tone.
"Sticks and stones may break your bones, but words will never hurt you."
Later, Hikari shows him how to fly. His halo is bright over his spiky red hair and his incarnadine eyes are unsure as he watches her. When she finally lands, having demonstrated and explained the basics of getting airborne, she encourages him to do the same.
He gulps, takes a deep breath and steels his nerves – then promptly loses it three times over until his feet at last separate from the ground. His crimson wings, far bigger than those of many others, thrust his up into the heavens, after the initial shock and fright, it feels like he'd always soared over the land below.
He laughs and swirls in the air and barely hears Hikari's impressed and slightly worried exclamations. He's so high up he can barely believe it. He plays and twirls in the air, than swoops low above a bridge on the far end of town.
That's when he hears it.
Crying. He'd know that sound anywhere. Heaves and sobs and misery transformed into sound. He stops abruptly and hovers in the air, just above the bridge.
There it is again.
He lands on the shore of the river and tries to glimpse below the stone structure of the bridge. There is a big hole in one side and dirty, muddy water oozes out. The sewer. The sound is coming from there.
He hears Hikari running behind him, sounding happy and oblivious, and ignores her. He spreads his wings again and floats over to the entrance to the sewer.
The space beneath the bridge is cramped and he can barely more the limbs that keep his afloat. He drops to the water below. It's cold for this time of year, but he tries to ignore the iciness crawling along his skin as he holes himself up and into the sewer.
The walls are sticky and cramped and though his wings are tightly folded and pressed to his back he manages to bump them against the walls and pipes. The crying is getting louder.
The stench increases also, but it urges him forward more than it drives him away. After a few more minutes, he receives relief in the shape of a alcove, a sort of room that couldn't really be called as such.
Most of the space is taken up by a cracked dome, one he realizes is much like his own had been, debris and filth. In the middle of it all lays a figure in white robes. It's curled up on the ground and shaking. It's light blue hair mussed and dirty, much like what remained of his cloths.
It's only then that he realizes that the shaking mass he'd previously mistakes as part of the broken dome is attached to the being's back. They're wings. Bent, twisted, quivering masses of flesh and feathers.
The feathers are dyed red with dried blood, the wings bend at odd angles. The sobbing hasn't stopped and neither has the shaking.
Tsubasa doesn't even hear himself screaming for Hikari to get help as he rushes to the wounded Haibane on the floor.
When he manages to drag the boy out the way he'd came, Tsubasa is immediately assaulted by hands that grab and pull at him. They take the newly found Haibane from him though he kicks and protests and soon Reki appears from the crowd and drags him away from the commotion.
He begs her to let him go to the wounded Haibane, but she shakes her head and promises to keep him posted on the other's condition. She promises to make sure the other is alright and that he could visit him later. She promises all this before she leaves him at Kana's.
"Alright," the brunette says as she ushers him in, her usual vigor gone "let's get those cuts of your treated before they can get infected. That, and you seriously need to bathe."
Not even a few hours later, a little girl with sunshine for hair comes bounding in, shouting to Kana about the wounded Haibane and how Reki had decided to move him to her house. She says other things as well, but there are too fast and too flustered for Tsubasa to understand properly.
By the panic that had flashed across Hikari's face, he deduced that was bad and pretty serious. Kuu, who had hastily introduced herself to him, told them that Reki and Hikari were bringing him over as they spoke and that they'd sent her to get the spare key from Kana.
The three of them hurry over to the raven's house where they quickly unlock the door and move any furniture that might get in the way. Not ten minutes later the two women appear, carrying between them a stretcher and a boy that couldn't have been much older than Tsubasa himself. It's the same boy that had been shaking and bloody on the sewer's floor. He's unconscious and a little bruised and still shaking like a leaf.
"It's a good thing you found him when you did," Kana says, stepping back as Reki lays the boy on the bed next to his. "He's already sick from the infection. I don't even want to think of the horror of growing your wings alone." she shuddered "Bad enough he was hatched alone in the sewer of all places. Poor kid took quite a few bumps and bruises from the tight space. He's lucky you got to him before the rats did."
The words might have been intended to make him feel better, but they only served to make him sick.
Reki hits Kana over the head angrily. "Shut up and grab a towel from the kitchen, he already has a fever."
Kana scowls, but obeys.
Tsubasa is left alone in the room as Reki and Hikari run around gathering medical supplies and brushes and settling them on the bedside table and every other available surface before sitting down – uncaring if they were kneeling on the floor or not – and getting to work.
He watches this, mesmerized, until Kuu tugs at his sleeve and tells him they'd better go. The place was already overcrowded, and the two of them wouldn't be able to do anything anyway. He'd done enough, she says.
Hesitating, Tsubasa lets the little girl tug him out of the house, promising himself he'd be back tomorrow to make sure the other was okay... and to apologize.
"Um, I'm really sorry." is the first thing he says when he next meets the wounded – and now recovering – Haibane, who was laying on his back in Reki's guestroom.
He's a boy about his age, sapphire eyes and light periwinkle hair that was chopped just below his ears. He was also in need of glasses, if what Nemu had told him was true. He is squinting a bit.
"Not your fault." is the stranger's hoarse reply. Tsubasa tries not to wince.
The stranger's wings – big, big as his own actually – are covered in bloody bandages and molting feathers. It's painful to even look at them for too long.
"It kinda is." He insists guiltily.
The boy doesn't seem convinced, but he is curious "How so?"
Tsubasa fidgets, sneaks a glanced at the still unnamed Haibane and decides the floorboards are far more interesting. "They found me around the time you hatched, you know? Apparently, eggs only appear once in a couple of months, sometimes over a year. They didn't expect the two of us to come at the same time, I think."
There is a pause. Tsubasa doesn't know what to say, his mind is busy drowning in guilt to think of anything.
"I'm sorry." he repeats finally.
He hears the rustling of sheets and looks up to see the other Haibane had sat up. "You apologize an awful lot." he commented, as though they had been discussing the weather. "But I think I can forgive you," he continued thoughtfully, then a smirk that sent a pang of familiarity through Tsubasa stretched across his face. "if you teach me how to use these." his thumb jerked in the direction of his back.
Tsubasa stared, astonished, before the words registered. A wide grin broke out on his face. "Okay!"
His enthusiasm must have been infectious, because a small smile – more genuine than the last – was now adorning the other boy's pale features as well.
"Hey, what's your name?" he asked suddenly.
Blushing in embarrassment and rubbing his head sheepishly, the red-head introduced himself "Oh, right, sorry, how silly of me... I completely forgot about that..." as he continued to further embarrass himself with his rambling, the patient in the bed seemed more and more inclined to laugh. Finally getting hold of his tongue, Tsubasa cleared his throat and straightened his back "I'm Tsubasa."
"Just Tsubasa? Huh, I'm..." he trailed off suddenly, his eyes widening.
Belatedly, Tsubasa realized what must have been going through the other's head. It was too late however, as the wounded Haibane began to shake and clutch at his head. "Oh, it's okay, it's okay –!" Tsubasa said soothingly, but his words were not met well.
"How is it okay?! I can't remember my own name!" the pale Haibane screeched out in desperation.
"Well, neither can I!" Tsubasa wasn't sure what he was supposed to say, but he had to at least try something. "No one can here. So that's why I'm gonna give you one."
The blue-haired boy blinked up at him owlishly, just as it downed on Tsubasa what he'd just promised to do. "Really?"
Nodding awkwardly, Tsubasa seated himself at the edge of the bed. The wounded Haibane was watching him like a hawk. Tsubasa gulped. "Yeah, just tell me about your dream."
The other seemed confused at this, just as Tsubasa had figured he'd be. "My dream?"
"Just do it, please."
"Uh, okay." He closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. "In my dream, I'm running away from something. Everything around me shifts and twists occasionally, like it's trying to contain me, to catch me. But I keep running and somewhere in the distance, there's this bright light I want to reach. I think I'll be safe there."
Tsubasa took a moment to consider this – and to consider how the dream must have made the other feel – before an idea hit him. He could almost feel the light-bulb shining above his head.
"I think... Arata!" his proclamation was met by silence. "Yeah Arata, for new beginnings!"
There was a long silence and, just when Tsubasa began to worry if he'd said something wrong, there quiet room was filled with chuckling.
"Arata, huh?" he smiles "I like it."
A few months passed without them noticing, but they were too content to care either way.
Tsubasa and Arata had formed a fast friendship and were often together. Tsubasa had moved into a quaint little house on the edge of the nearby forest and Arata had moved in with him soon after. It was a two-story family house of stone, with enough bedrooms to fit both of them and any company that might stay over.
This arrangement didn't last long, since Arata had had an eye on a house near the market for quite a while. Even after he moved out, they friendship hadn't suffered in the slightest. They still hung out almost every day.
It was during a tranquil summer afternoon – the two of them had joined some other Haibane in a game of soccer – when Tsubasa clumsily kicked the ball right through the window of an old shack. Naturally, he was the one who had to go and get it. Fortunately, Arata volunteered to go with him.
That's when they found it – an unhatched Haibane egg.
Within half an hour, Tsubasa could have sworn that half the town had gathered around the shack. Being the one that had found the egg however, meant that he wouldn't have to deal with the pushy crowds. He would be there to witness the birth of a new Haibane. His heart quickened in excitement.
"So, what do you think they'll be like?" Arata asked in hushed tones from his spot next to him while they lean on the wooden wall of the shack, waiting. He merely shrugs the question off. Who knew?
"Don't know," he said, wondering "but I think I'll like them."
Arata just raised an eyebrow at him "Why do you say that?"
Tsubasa smiled. "Just a hunch."
"So, tell us about your dream?"
It's the first thing Hikari blurts out to the newborn Haibane. Then she flushes when the boy's deep indigo eyes stare at her as if she'd suddenly turned green and sprouted several antennae from her forehead.
It'd been an hour since they brought him to the Old Home and he'd woken up just moments before. While the other was unconscious, Tsubasa had taken the liberty to look him over.
He was a strange one.
His hair was long and shaggy, yet somehow gave him a "cool" look that complimented his tan skin. His face was thin and heart-shaped and it was obvious he smiled a lot. He looked about eighteen or older and was rather tall.
He looked familiar.
The teen in question blinked, bemused "My what?" Tsubasa could sympathize with the stranger, silently lamenting Hikari's sudden loss of tact. Wait, was she blushing?
Thankfully, Kuu came to her rescue. "Your dream silly," the diminutive ball of sunshine chirped "how else are we supposed to name you?"
The teen was frowning now, Tsubasa could almost see the clogs of his mind turning "Why would you need to give me a name, it's–" he cut himself off abruptly, startled.
"I can't remember my name."
Kuu nodded. "That's normal."
"Normal? Are you mental?"
Reki frowned at his words disapprovingly "Well, that was rude."
Tsubasa decided to intervene before things got even more out of hand. "Um, Mister, your dream?"
For a moment, the guy looked like he was going to argue but then something in his expression shifted – softened – and he averted his gaze as if unable to look at Tsubasa for a moment longer.
"Oh, alright. I dreamt of..." again he cut himself off, scowling at his bed-sheets.
Tsubasa suppressed a worried frown.
"Of what?" he pressed. And again, it was as though the fight had simply got out of the newborn at the prodding.
"Of blackness." he answered finally.
"Blackness?"
The young man nodded "Yeah, darkness surrounding me on all sides with no light in sight."
"That's a bit scary." Hikari shuddered.
Tsubasa, however, had other things on his mind "It's kinda like mine." he murmured.
Reki just shrugged "Yeah, but there's someone protecting you in yours, Tsubasa."
Kuu frowned in thought, which made for more of pout on her young, childish face. "So Yami, right?"
The newborn shook his head, shaggy violet locks swaying this way and that. "Uh, don't like the sound of it."
A pause. A heartbeat.
"How about Dark then?"
Dark blinked in confusion. "Huh?"
Tsubasa grinned, the name really did seem to suit him. "Dark? Would you like to be called Dark?"
For the first time, the strangers worried features seemed to relax. He nods, smiling.
"Yeah, I think I would."
That evening, he spends his time waiting in the Old Home with Reki and Hikari. The fever had already set in and dark, bruised lumps of flesh and growing bone had formed on Dark's back. His breathing was haggard and came in short, shallow gasps as he clutched at the sheets beat him.
Abruptly, he starts screaming.
Wings of pure black rise towards the ceiling minutes later, like hands reaching for the heavens, and the body they sprouted from arches and withers from the pain they cause it.
Tsubasa springs to his feet, holding Dark down by his right arm while Reki pushed down on the other. Dark still withers and twists, his muscles enduring spasm after painful spasm until, finally, he stilled, exhausted.
Tsubasa stays with him throughout the rest of the night.
Whether from paranoia or some kind of hunch, Arata finds another unhatched egg on the other side of town. Thus, while Tsubasa tends to Dark, Arata tends to the newcomer – who he names Haruto, a distant light.
When the first rays of pale sunlight drifted into the room, Tsubasa was still busy scrubbing away at the black feathers. Dark's wings were massive, bigger than his even. That was not what worried him though, what worried him was the color they were painted.
Pure, pitch black.
"Reki, he's gonna be okay, right?"
The older Haibane hesitated before answering. "I don't know, kid."
He raised his head to look at her "But... he's special... like me, isn't he?"
Reki's eyes were far away, her voice unreadable and not at all reassuring.
"Yeah, he is."
They were two beings that seemed to exist to contradict each other.
Dark was lively, mischievous and a bit of a flirt. His flamboyant and joking personality was in sharp contrast with the sad, serious look he'd sometimes get in his eyes. Tsubasa had grown rather close to the shaggy-haired teen, and these instances worried him. Sometimes, it seemed as though Dark knew more than he was letting on, but whenever Tsubasa questioned him he always managed to change the subject somehow. Tsubasa tried not to dwell on it too much. Besides, what could Dark possibly be hiding?
Haruto – who had become a close friend of Arata's – on the other hand was a severe and solemn kind of person, rarely laughed and was quick to anger despite how calm he usually acted. He and Arata shared a strange bond, but somehow, Arata had managed to worm his way behind the other teen's defenses.
The thing that set Dark and Haruto apart from everyone else though, was far more obvious. You had to be blind not to see it.
Their wings were five times bigger than that of the average Haibane, at least, and twice the size of Tsubasa's and Arata's. What's more, one was so black it was hard to discern one feather from another while the other's was so bright they seemed to posses a glow of their own.
It wasn't natural, which prompted most to shun them. Arata and Tsubasa, who were also victimized because of the color of their plumage – bright, bloody red and periwinkle blue – had formed a group with the two older boys.
Most of the town had taken an instant dislike to Dark and all those associated with him. This led them to shun Tsubasa as well, but strangely the red-head didn't mind. Dark was a much better friend than they had been, and he was firm in the conviction that Dark would never turn his back on him.
The town also all but worshiped Haruto for his brilliantly untainted feathers, though he gave them all the cold shoulder. Most did not realize that he was completely different from what his plumage might suggest, as was Dark.
Their ginormous wings set them apart, laying a heavy burden on their backs. Literally. Because of their wing span, it was impossible for them to be folded comfortably against one's back. They were left unattended to trail in the dust behind the figure's of Haruto and Dark.
The dust and dirt that coated them over the day would often mask their true colors. Haruto's shine would dull and the pureness of his feathers would be stained with mud and grime. He'd grumble and rage, but could do nothing about it. Meanwhile, Dark's would lighten in shade and disguise themselves in the dusty earth. During the day, they were masked by layer upon layer of dust and soil, making them brighter than they originally were – so much so that they could almost be mistaken for that of a regular Haibane. Almost.
But the fact was that the four of them were different from everybody else, though Dark and Haruto often took the blunt of people's gossip and disdainful stares.
Dark. Haruto. They were very different from each other – almost exact polar opposites – but strangely they completed each other without even meaning to.
The most ironic part was that, most of the time, they were too annoyed at each other to notice that they had actually become friends.
Hey, Tsubasa?" Dark calls to him one day.
"Hmm?"
"Do you want to go over the wall?"
In a moment, Tsubasa is coughing up a spoonful of his lunch, his eyes bulging. When his hacking subsides enough for him to speak, he croaks out: "Wha-? Dark! That's forbidden!"–he coughs–"Besides, no one can fly up there. No one has the wing power."
There's an all too familiar smirk on the other's lips, and one might have even called it playful. "You wanna bet?"
"Dark.." Tsubasa whines, exasperated.
His companion sighs. "I feel like a caged bird here Tsubasa, don't you? Don't you ever wonder what's out there, outside this little haven?"
Uncertainty flashes across the red-head's face, but he doesn't try to hide it. He knows he could never hide anything from Dark. The man was too perceptive for that. "I do, but... I'm not done exploring this side of the wall either."
Dark stares at him, his indigo eyes deep and thoughtful before he grins "Che, yeah, I guess your right? Besides, I can't go anywhere without my little sidekick, can I now?" his hand reaches towards the shorter boy, ruffling his already messy hair.
Tsubasa splutters indignantly.
"Wha-? Sidekick? You jerk! I'm not your sidekick!"
"Daisuke, don't forget, I exist inside of you."
Tsubasa dreams of black feathers and a reassuring presence with a mischievous smile on his face.
"And remember, Dark, I exist inside you. I won't forget you either."
The dream never occupies the cobwebs of his mind long enough for him to remember it.
"I'll never forget you..."
AN: Uh, okay, that was so weird? Yes, definitely weird. Still, I posted it and would really appreciate any and all commentary, suggestions, critics etc. Please forgive me if I messed up the names somehow, I'm not Japanese and my knowledge of the language is very limited. Still, I hope you enjoyed reading this.