A/N: I've beta proofed this as best I could. And since I'm not working on Chapter Three, I figured it was okay to go ahead and post this one. I kinda got into it more than I thought I would.

The Angel's Façade
Chapter One – The Whimsical Grail

"There, all done." Daisuke gleamed happily, once he had finally managed to transfer the notes into his computer. He had to slightly alter them to work with modernized equipment, but he was sure he could change the instrument option if he really needed to hear it in a different way. He had borrowed his dad's laptop to download a digital music creator so he could copy the notes left in the book they had found almost a week before. With Dark's help, many of the erratic notes written in both German and Latin were successfully translated. 'Dark?'

'Hm.' The short voice of his friend echoed in his mind.

'I finished the translation and put the song into the computer. I found the translation for the French words too. The title of this piece is "The Whimsical Grail." I'm not quite sure what the lyrics mean though. It's a little too above me.' He chuckled a bit, trying to keep a lighthearted tone with Dark, who had displayed a strange behavior since they found the book.

'Whimsical Grail huh? That almost sounds like something he would say.'

'Well, if this really was written by Krad, why wouldn't he remember it?' Daisuke wondered, but he knew there were probably many reasons to explain it.

'Probably the same reason I don't remember what happened in the first few generations that I've been living with the Niwas. Though, what confuses me is that he was a Hikari. And some how ended up part of the Kokuyoku. I wish I knew more of what happened.'

'Maybe we could ask him?'

'Do you enjoy having your head attached?'

'Well duh.'

'Then talking to Krad is not a good idea. He's out for my blood, remember? And for what it's worth, maybe it's not important. Maybe that isn't even the same Krad.'

'You don't believe that for once second, Dark.'

'…No, I don't but…damn it…why can't this make some sense! GAH.' Dark's agitation was felt by Daisuke in waves. He felt for his other half because it was something that only he could figure out.

'At any rate, I got the song finished. Want to listen to it? It won't sound exactly like the artist intended, because the instrument isn't the same I'm sure, but it will give you the basic notes of the song.'

'Okay, I'm curious to see what that Angel Winged Devil supposedly created.' He said in an almost bored tone. He didn't expect that Krad was very a impressive artist, if it was the same man. After all, the Hikari family was notorious for massive artistic genius. If all of Krad Hikari's works were in one notebook stowed away on a dusty, rotting shelf, they must not have been exceedingly extraordinary.

Daisuke nodded and moved the pointer with the touch pad on the laptop and tapped it twice to start the play button on the song. It started slow and almost toneless, but the computer software pushed the notes through the program and suddenly it felt like the very room came alive when the melodies sang the very soul of the writer out. There was such a complex contradiction of notes and the sounds clashed so beautifully that it sounded like a weave of music. He could almost hear the sound of a beautiful tenor voice overlaying Latin words so passionately that it made it seem like it was the very last thing on Earth that he was going to do.

Within his mind, Daisuke knew that Dark was equally as captivated by the music, albeit skewed by the modern program. He could only imagine how grandeur the song would have been, performed by the inexplicable genius that had created such an awe inspiring masterpiece.

"Wow." Whispered a voice that was neither his own or Dark's. Daisuke turned to face the admiring face of his rather strange father. "That is what you were working on in that program?"

The redheaded boy nodded, and allowed his dad to lean over to see the notes and all of the individual chords he had painstakingly sorted into the system. "The song is called-"

"The Whimsical Grail," His grandfather's voice added from the doorway.

'What is this? A damn family meeting?' Dark grumbled, irritated by the interruption while listening to such a soothing song.

"Wait, how do you know its name?" Daisuke asked the very next question that would have come from Dark, had he not been busy getting irritated all over again.

"There's a copy of the song imprinted on the back of one of another Hikari painting, also called The Whimsical Grail." Daiki Niwa explained, looking over Kosuke's shoulder while the younger man picked up the aged book from in front of the computer.

"I looked to see if there was anything on this mysterious book that the two of you found. What I found was virtually nothing. All I know is that this book was made before the Kokuyoku. And the only notation of a musical composure relating to it was written on the back of one painting. This seems to be the one just because it has a more involved construction."

'That makes it even more likely to be the same Krad then…damn, I was hoping it was a freaky coincidence.' Dark said privately to Daisuke.

'You knew it wasn't a freaky coincidence. You went looking for it because you knew.' The red head replied with a chipper tone. He knew it was eating away at his other half, but sometimes Dark was so much of a chiding beast that he couldn't help but chide back now that the opportunity had kindly presented itself.

'I didn't know! I had a hunch, but I knew absolutely nothing, damn it!'

"Hey Dad, can you tell mom that we're going out for a while?" Daisuke asked suddenly, letting his dad feel free to look through the pages of the book. He figured that his dad would find something if anyone did. He may not have been born a Niwa, but he was clearly the best researcher the Niwa family ever had.

"Sure thing, Dai, mind if I let your mother listen to this? This is incredible."

"Oh sure…actually, let me burn it to a CD before we go! We'll take it with us so you can feel free to mess with this one." Daisuke grinned pleasantly. He plucked a CD case from the top of the cluttered desk and opened it quickly to confirm it was blank. Satisfied with his finding, he pulled the glaring disk from the case and popped the disk drive of the laptop open. A few quick clicks and he was ready to burn an audio CD capable of playing on a regular CD player. It would be the best way imaginable to get his point across when…

'Where are we going Daisuke?' Dark interrogated him fiercely once he set the computer to run while he jumped about grabbing his coat and gathering his things.

'We're going to go say hi to Krad.'

A long moment of utter silence followed before a volcano erupted, 'Are you insane!?' Dark's voice sounded booming in his head and he winced slightly, 'He will kill us dead! Dead! He won't even laugh about it either, it'll be too pathetic! Like we walked right into his choke hold and asked him to strangle us to death!'

'Well for your information, Dark, I'm going to talk to Hiwatari, and hopefully he can talk to Krad for us.'

'I still see the "Hiwatari can't control the crazy fucking bastard and he'll change out and strangle us to death" scene happening if you do this!'

'I talk to Hiwatari all the time, Dark! It shouldn't be any different.'

'Except he'll have to wake up our murderer from his precious mind sleep. Then we get to die a loser's death.'

'Are you that afraid of losing to him?'

'Yes! ...I mean shit, no, I'm not afraid of losing to him I'm afraid of him getting involved in this!'

'This is about him!'

'And what if it's the source of his freaking madness! The guy's off his rocker, Daisuke. For all we know, this could be bloody mild. He could be total hell spawn worse than already!'

'We can't rely on records and your memory to solve this. That book is Krad's. It has his name on it. The writing looks like a style a man like him would write. Half of the notes were written the same way he talks! You were the one who magically scoped it out of its hiding spot, so stop worrying. He might even thank you for finding it.'

'Yeah okay…I'm just gonna hand him the knife with which he can stab us. Are you okay with that? I'll even ask him how I should stand when he shanks us in the middle of Hiwatari's apartment.'

'Dark…I don't think he would kill us in the apartment…that would be too messy and not nearly sadistic enough.'

'Don't appreciate his evil habits, for god's sake!'

"Daisuke, your CD finished." Kosuke's voice reached his son's ears and the redhead jumped to attention, ignoring the further protests of his inner half. He took the CD from the computer drive and shut it back into the case so he could carry it with him.

"Thanks dad, don't let mom worry, we'll be back later!" He chirped, waving before he darted out the door, stepping into his shoes on the way out. He trotted along the road, noting how Dark had suddenly gotten quiet again.

'Dark?'

'I'm telling you. I have a bad feeling about this. Something just feels wrong about willingly asking Krad to come play nice with us. Besides, Hiwatari isn't going to want to play this dumb game either!'

'Ah, stop being so negative. We've had the book for a week now...we have an actual composition now that we can use to try to see if he actually knows it. If we don't do anything then what was the point?'

'The point was to stop me from hallucinating about that bastard book every time I think about Krad!'

'Every time you think about Krad? Just how often do you think about him?'

'Daisuke.' A warning tone and Daisuke knew to lay off the joking.

Daisuke stayed thankfully quiet and didn't question Dark any more afterward. Dark didn't want to have to explain the ill feeling he got when ever he thought about Krad and how every time he tried to picture the man's image in his mind, it never looked like it should. Always smiling, though never did Krad smile wholeheartedly. Krad's smile was more of a sick grin of sadism. But the image he always conjured up spelled a completely different picture.

A growl subconsciously erupted into his mind and he felt a wave of tingling anxiety even in his spiritual form. He didn't want to pursue this…it had just fell onto him because he had been so stricken by that vision of that black book with the gold trim. On the bright side, he was free to fantasize all he wanted about that blonde haired twat and he didn't have seizures about books. And by fantasize he definitely did not mean of the naughty variety. Of course not.

'We're here.' Daisuke's voice crackled in his brain like an electric wave, and he would have jumped if he were on the outside.

'Already?! No way.'

'While you were spacing out, I ran the rest of the way.'

'Why are you getting so crazy over this?'

'I'm making up for your lack of motivation.' Daisuke chuckled in his head before he leaned an arm forward to press the button. He knew that Hiwatari would be home. There was never much the boy had to do on Sunday afternoons and he was grateful for that. So when the door opened slowly and hesitantly, he plastered a smile on his face. He was certain that his friend would be a little surprised to see him. He'd only stopped by once to bring him homework from school, not that he would have any trouble catching up. He was a genius after all. But since that time he'd never really been back to his friend's apartment.

"Niwa?" The blue eyed boy blinked seeing Daisuke Niwa smiling like a rainbow beamed a bucket of skittles into his breakfast that morning. Happy. Ever so happy.

"Hey, Hiwatari. I was kinda hoping you'd give me a minute of your time." He started hesitantly. Getting to the point was crucial with the young commander.

The door opened wider and Hiwatari nodded him into the apartment. "What's wrong?"

A moment of silent phrasing and rephrasing and he finally figured out a way to start this very strange conversation. "First, I have a CD and I was wondering if you'd listen to it for me?"

Hiwatari blinked incredulously. He came over to listen to a CD? What? "Okay, is it a particularly special CD or something?"

"Well…it is, kinda…I can't really tell you yet, do you mind?" Daisuke asked, holding the case out to him. He was relieved when his friend took the CD and starting walking toward the stereo system set up in the living room. The adoptive father, the elder Hiwatari, was never there from what he gathered, and he was thankful for it now.

"This is a really strange request. I just hope you're aware of that." Hiwatari added before he pressed the eject button and the machine came alive, and spit its CD holding tongue out waiting to swallow the CD into its disc reading belly. With a gentle click, the machine closed and whirred while it read the disc. Daisuke waited anxiously as every second passed.

He had already decided to bring the finished song to Hiwatari once it was finished. He just never told Dark that. If he had, Dark would have surely not allowed him to finish putting the music into the computer.

The notes began to sift out of the speaker and much louder and much clearer than before, since before it was on laptop speakers. This however, as the tune progressed, was alarmingly crisper. Alarming. Because the music Daisuke was hearing now, was not even the same instrument he had set it to play. It was as if the song had dictated the sounds it wanted to emit from the system and had changed the data to suit it. This was much more powerful than the flawed computer version.

Hiwatari listened to the song, but didn't hear the song. He heard the very soul of the creation. From deep within him he heard a voice and a steady mantra. My song.…

….My song…

….My precious song….

Though wordless in this form, it elevated his very heart. There was a temporary pang of pleasantness before it all shattered. The song was drowned out by a very angry growl. A growl that progressively became louder in Hiwatari's mind until it resembled a screech.

Turn that fucking thing off NOW!

I don't want to hear it anymore!

If you don't, I will!

Hiwatari clutched his head from the painful echoes that his inner half had created with his blaring anger. He could not fathom how a collection of melodies had created such a flare in the usually stoic Angel's temperament. In fact, this was so much of a surprise that he couldn't really focus and winced as the words were yelled louder in his head.

"Hiwatari!" Daisuke called, concerned. He rushed to his friend's side. It was always his first reaction, but he paused seeing Hiwatari's hand held out, meant to keep him away. One of his eyes had bled golden and he knew at that moment that it would be suicide to help the slate haired boy.

'I told you this was a bad idea, Daisuke!' Dark growled, seeing Krad obviously had woken from his sleep within his host and was enraged. Even while he knew bad things would happen, he had not expected it so irrationally violent. As long as he had feuded with the white winged devil, he had known him to be an impassive egomaniac. There was never a time he could remember Krad having any other response with anything other than hatred or sadism. This was clearly neither. Though, he had at least confirmed there was something between the music and his other half.

In a flurry of motion, Hiwatari's hand shot out. Or rather, Krad forced it to. With remarkable intent the boy's fist smashed into the front of the CD player. Daisuke could see the shock of pain that went through Hiwatari's face, but the eyes belonged to Krad. They were glowing golden with anger. A crackling anger that almost made Daisuke want to cower back but he moved forward despite the paralyzing fear that rippled through him.

Half of his friend's body resembled Krad. The eyes, the angry snarl, the threatening fists clenched at his sides. 'How dare you bring that hideous noise into my presence!?' His voice echoed over Hiwatari's. So pure was his rage against the sounds that he didn't even finish the song and was ready to destroy everything. Within his mind Hiwatari was paralyzed by the unusual display of unbridled fury. Krad was always so contained. Always so analytic about what he was doing. What had Niwa done?

Daisuke backed up and suddenly the world became farther away as he looked through his eyes in a far distant manner. Dark had forced him back and had taken over his body. 'Dark!'

'Relax, amateur. You got us into this mess. I merely intend to keep it from getting worse and I won't hurt your friend.' He promised Daisuke, but he couldn't guarantee that he wouldn't put a proverbial whoop ass on Krad.

"Why are you getting your panties in such a twist, Krad. I was just coming to say hi." Dark smirked, trying to rile up the familiar sadistic hunter that Krad had always been when he chased Dark down and threatened his life. But much to his alarm, Krad's anger was more unfaltering than he would have liked.

'You picked a terrible way to express your pleasantries, Dark Mousy!'

Dark stepped back, blinking widely. O…kay. This wasn't normal. "Chill the fuck out, Krad. It's a damn song!" He howled, jumping out of the way of a sudden light sphere that had the ability to blow his leg off if it touched.

'IT'S MY SONG!'

His voice exploded the silence with a furious howl, progressively losing octaves until it was clear that Krad had released Hiwatari from his temporary insanity and hid himself within his host's mind.

Hiwatari gasped. His knees hit the floor and he buckled forward. He felt like his head was on fire. His eyes hurt and he could barely breathe. The raging had surged inside him until he felt Krad completely stop. He blinked slowly. He…stopped? Just like that?

"Hiwatari?" Dark's voice invaded his senses.

The younger of the two gasped for air before he tried to look up at Dark through broken glasses. "He…he stopped."

"Stopped? He must have closed you off then." Dark kneeled, surveying the damage. Being careful not to hurt him, he lifted Hiwatari's hand and noted the busted knuckles and blood crusting as it dried. "He didn't even think this time…"

"He…keep screaming, 'my song' over and over." Hiwatari coughed and allowed Dark to help him up. He would have, under any other circumstance, pushed Dark away and threatened to turn him in to the police; but the thief had found something that had brought out a strange reaction in his little spiritual parasite. "What have you guys done?" He looked up analytically, searching for a clue in Dark's expression.

"We found something that used to belong to a Hikari. And apparently, he's not happy with his masterpiece anymore."

To be Continued…

A/N: Thanks for the reviews! I do appreciate the encouragement! And my beta The Lantern. I think I fixed all my boo-boos.