Chapter 4

AN: So, I was gonna post this in May and it's suddenly July. Wow, I fail. I was having some trouble deciding if I should change a part of this chapter or not, but yeah, sorry. And I need to get working on chapter eight, ha ha. But five should be up within the week, I promise!

Disclaimer: The story you are about to read is full of things I don't own. The names have not been changed because that would be kinda pointless.

Ahiru and Fakir waited in the smith's home for the rest of the night, but Charon did not return. It began to get very late and Fakir was looking out the window from where he sat, noticeably worried. Ahiru stared at him for a while, trying to think of something to say to make him feel better. "M-maybe he had a delivery to make out of town or something!" she finally said as cheerfully as she could. "We did kind of leave in a hurry early this morning."

"But I didn't even notice him then," Fakir replied, not looking at her or seeming any calmer. "I know I was a little preoccupied with you, but the fact is I haven't heard or seen anything of Charon all day."

Ahiru felt a bit guilty, and it showed. "Sorry..." she muttered.

"What are you apologizing for?" Fakir asked, turning his attention back to her.

"Well, you were so busy with me this morning that you might have missed him, right?"

Fakir exhaled. "Look, this isn't your fault. Like I said before, if he couldn't find me and he had to go somewhere, he would have left a note. Don't blame yourself."

"Ah...okay," she answered, still looking sad.

The minutes continued to tick by, neither of them speaking. As it grew later, Ahiru began nodding her head a bit, obviously struggling to keep her eyes open. After this continued for several minutes, Fakir looked at her with a bit of concern before speaking. "You should go get some sleep," he finally said.

"Huh?" she replied, waking herself up a bit more. "But where am I supposed to go?"

"Just go to my room," he answered, looking toward the hallway.

"Wait, but if I sleep in there, where are you gonna sleep?"

"I'm going to wait up for Charon," he replied.

"But.... But what if he doesn't get back tonight?" Ahiru said, sounding upset. "You have to go somewhere!"

"I can figure something out," Fakir replied, attempting to smile a little. "Besides, you had a busy day. You should get some rest."

"But I..."

"Just go."

She looked at him for a bit, frowning in concern. "Alright," she finally replied, turning and leaving. Fakir watched her leave the room, then turned his attention back to the window.

The next day, Ahiru blinked a bit as she awoke, the light hitting her face. She felt a bit dazed for a moment, although the ceiling above her looked somewhat familiar. "That was a weird dream," she mumbled, still half asleep. "I thought I was a girl again and Fakir and I were trying to find out what happened and I stayed at his house for the rest of the night."

She sat up and rubbed her eyes, the covers sliding off her. It took her a few more moments to assess the situation. "Wait, I really am a girl!" she exclaimed, looking at herself in shock again. "It wasn't a dream! And I am in Fakir's room!" she noted, looking across the room at her small and now a bit mussed up basket that she used to fit into. "But wait, where is Fakir?"

She got up and quickly made her way to the kitchen, only to find that Fakir was still in the same chair he had been sitting in when she left. However, he had fallen asleep, his arms and head resting on the table in front of him. Ahiru smiled and tried to walk past him quietly, only to catch her foot on one of the other chairs and send both it and herself crashing to the floor.

The noise woke up Fakir, who lifted his head and quietly murmured, "Huh?"

"Owwww...."

"What... What are you doing?" he asked, still sounding tired.

She laughed nervously as she sat up, rubbing her head. "Well, you see, I saw you were sleeping so I was trying to sneak around the table and not wake you up..."

Fakir had an expression on his face than seemed to be a mixture of annoyance and amusement. "Moron," he muttered.

"So, um," Ahiru began, brushing herself off, "why are you still out here, Fakir?"

"I told you, I was waiting for..." he began, suddenly stopping mid-sentence. His eyes widened and his expression verged on panic. "Charon! He's still not back yet!"

"Maybe he'll come back later today!" she suggested, grinning nervously and scratching her head.

Fakir turned his head and looked at the wall. "I don't know. Something still seems odd about this."

"...So what should we do then?"

"I'm not sure," he replied. "I want to wait for Charon to get back, but we still need to find out what happened to you. I'm starting to get the feeling that somehow the two are related..."

"Huuh?! How?"

"Two incredibly strange things happened in one day. I think the odds of that being a coincidence are quite low, especially if, like Autor said, this is a story."

"Yeah, but we still don't know..."

"We should go investigate some more," Fakir suddenly said, looking very serious and standing up. "We need to make sure everything else in town is all right."

"But," Ahiru began, "shouldn't we eat breakfast first or something?"

"Oh, yeah. Right," he said, frowning as this came back to him.

Ahiru watched him quietly with concern. She knew all of this was bothering Fakir, but he really shouldn't be forgetting to eat. She wondered if she could do anything to help him.

The day was mostly uneventful. After breakfast, they began wandering the town again to make sure things were as they were supposed to be. Nothing appeared to be out of place, and they found that they could easily leave the city's walls if they so chose. However, when they returned home, Charon was still no where to be seen.

Things continued like this for the next few days until practically every portion of the town, the school, the outlying area, and the lake had been checked. Fakir was growing more and more anxious. The lack of clues as to what happened to Ahiru were bad enough, but the disappearance of his father-figure was starting to weigh on him mentally as well. Ahiru would try to give him encouraging words when she could, not sure of what else she could do for him. And at least she could give him those words, she noted.

So they found themselves five days since Ahiru had mysteriously become a girl again. She was beginning to wonder if they should just start trying to lead somewhat normal lives at this point. They could not find a story being written about this anywhere, she had tried quacking to see if that changed her back, but to no avail, and Fakir had stated that he refused to write anything about the matter. It was true that Charon was still missing, but she really could not think of anything else to do in this situation.

She had just finished nervously expressing this opinion to Fakir as they stood in the main part of the shop, whose initial reaction was to frown. However, he thought about it for a few moments and sighed. "You have a point," he said. "If things stay like this, sooner or later we're going to get into trouble if all we do is patrol the town everyday."

"So, what should we do then?" she asked, trying to give him a small smile.

"I don't know," he replied, slamming his hands on the work table and looking incredibly stressed. "I can't think of anything to do at all. Nothing! I can't even figure out what did this to you!"

Ahiru was becoming very worried. "Fakir..." she began, slowly walking toward him.

Just then, the door flew open. They both looked at it in surprise and Fakir quickly made his way toward it, followed by Ahiru. Fakir stopped a few feet away and extended his arm to stop her, although she nearly walked into it anyway. A figure was slumped over, leaning on the door frame and panting. Fakir watched cautiously before speaking. "Who's there?"

"It's me," the intruder panted, finally collecting himself a bit and standing up, though he was still short of breath.

"Autor? What happened?"

"I found something," he replied with a serious look on his face and a hint of panic.

"Really?" Ahiru exclaimed. "What is it?"

Autor held up a sheet of paper. "I was...investigating the story...that turned her into a girl...and I found this."

"Come on," Fakir said, heading into the main shop where the light was better as the other two followed him.

Autor, now breathing a bit easier, slammed the sheet onto the table. "See?" he said, looking at them. "This is an excerpt from this story."

"Just one page?" Fakir asked, studying the paper itself. "Where did you find this?"

"It was sitting on top of a box I found in the library," Autor replied, frowning. "This was all I could find. It's almost as though it's not finished yet and not being written constantly like Drosslemeyer's story was."

"That doesn't make sense," Fakir said, thinking. "Why is Ahiru still a girl, then?"

"I'm not sure. This writer seems to have different powers than you do, though. It's like they can write a bit and then leave us to our own devices."

"It does look that way," Fakir replied as he began to read it, Ahiru peering over his shoulder. "It's not a manuscript, though. It looks like it's already been printed. How did that happen?"

"I don't know," Autor answered, frowning. "But I think we need to find out what's going on soon. I have a bad feeling about..."

He suddenly stopped talking. Fakir, who was still reading the beginning of the page, waited for a moment before saying, "About what, Aut...?" He and Ahiru looked back up at him, only to find that Autor was no longer standing there.

"...Autor?!"

"Where did he go?" Ahiru asked, looking around the room.

Fakir stared at the empty space, his mind clearly trying to connect the pieces. "I don't know. It's like he vanished."

"What?! How?"

"I have a feeling..." Fakir began, going back to the piece of paper and reading it intently. As he neared the end, his scowl increased. "What is this?" he murmured.

"What is what?" she asked, trying to sneak a peak around his shoulder again.

"This story. It's definitely about you turning into a girl again, but for the most part it's so... vague. Somehow it's managed to do all of this with almost no details. It's not even complete."

"Well, didn't Autor say he thought it was still being written?"

"Yes, but it looks like this just stopped a few days ago and nothing's been written at all since then. Although if anything else has been written, I guess we wouldn't know. This page stops right after..." His eyes suddenly widened and he looked a little embarrassed.

"Right after what?" Ahiru asked, cocking her head.

"Nothing," he replied quickly. "Don't worry about it. The fact is it only seems to cover events through the morning when you turned into a girl and that's it."

Ahiru frowned. "So then who's writing it?"

"I still don't know," Fakir answered, his scowl returning.

"Well, what does that fancy thing on the top of the page say?" she asked, pointing at something.

"It says... This doesn't make sense...."

AN: What's going to happen to Fakir and Ahiru? You'll have to wait for the next chapter to find out!

"Did you hear something?"