Chapter 5 - Disappearing Dust

He threw off the covers, stumbling out of bed as he did so. A streak of pain stabbed at him, forcing a veil of black over his eyes. He refused to give in, shaking it off. He had to find the Feather.

He knew Dark had found it. Otherwise, he wouldn't have found himself at home, right? And anyway, at one moment in the museum, he had found himself on the border of consciousness and unconsciousness. In that instant, he had seen Dark grab the Feather...

Now where was it?

Frantically, he limped about the room. Searching, searching.

He slammed drawers open and closed; he searched the carpet, every inch of his room. He even searched his pile of dirty clothes and looked at the roof around his window.

But in a few minutes, he had practically ripped the room apart. Only to come up with nothing.

'No…'

Horror seeped into him, filled his mind. How could he have lost it? What was he going to do now?

How could he have lost it?

Desperately, he rummaged around his room once more.

He gasped, spotting something fluffy hidden in the shadow of his bedside cabinet.

'The Feather?' he thought hopefully.

He reached for it, holding it up to the light.

No. It was white. Not the glossy black he was looking for.

Daisuke gazed at it curiously. 'Krad's?'

He pushed the thought aside, saving it for later. He needed to focus on the task at hand.

Moments later. . . still no Feather Token.

Failure pulled at his emotions, reminding him of his physical pain, and he realized there was no reason to fight it any longer. He collapsed in a heap, the black overwhelming him.

- - - - -

Daisuke. . .

His mind began to stir. Who was calling him?

Daisuke. . .

His name echoed about his mind, poking at him, but barely arousing him from slumber.

'What? What do you want?'

DAISUKE!

Abruptly, he was pulled back to reality.

The redhead gasped. His temples throbbed, his eardrums felt as though they were going to burst from the horrendous shout he had heard just moments ago. Black dots floated in front of his eyes, and his vision couldn't seem to focus quite yet.

"Wh- Mom. . . Ow. . . Don't do that," he whispered hoarsely.

"AAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH, DAISUKE, I WAS SO WORRIED ABOUT YOU!"

He was suddenly engulfed by a pair of rose-scented arms. Mrs. Niwa easily squeezed the breath out of poor Daisuke. What saved him from death by suffocation was the sudden wheezing and shudders that racked his body. His mother let go of him immediately. Worry creased her face.

"Ooooooooh, Daisuke I'm so sorry!" she squealed.

Daisuke hopelessly covered his ears. "It's alright," he managed to cough out. "Now please stop shouting!"

Emiko was just about to scream out another apology before she caught herself and clamped a hand over her mouth. She nodded silently.

She gave her son a few minutes to settle back into bed before she asked, "How are you feeling, honey?"

"Awful," he admitted. "My head hurts, my throat hurts, my chest hurts. – It hurts to talk or even think. Dark used magic while we were at the museum. I've experienced the pain before, but it never hurt this much before. Dark always managed to heal most of it away."

Mrs. Niwa looked at him with a curious look. "That's odd…" she said thoughtfully. Then she shrugged. "It's alright. You go ahead and go back to sleep, Daisuke. It'll probably be much better in the morning."

"How did I get home?" He held up the white feather he had found. "Did Satoshi bring me home?"

She thought for a moment.

"Hmmm . . . Maybe. We saw him fly past with Dark a while ago. . ."

Daisuke nodded. 'We can ask him about it tomorrow.'

Then Daisuke remembered. "Mom, the Feather's missing!"

She didn't answer for a while. Her eyebrows furrowed in confusion. After a few moments, she merely grinned at him and said, "Good night, Daisuke!"

She stood up, giving him a thumbs up reassuringly before she walked out. After she had closed Daisuke's door quietly, Emiko turned around, almost ramming into her husband. She yelped in surprise.

"Is he alright?"

Emiko took a few deep breaths to calm herself and stop the hyperventilation. She shook her head. "It's probably just because Dark used a bit of magic back at the museum. He'll be better in the morning!"

Kosuke nodded. "Alright."

"But he didn't seem to remember giving Risa the Feather. He claimed that it was missing. Maybe they didn't mean to give it to her?" Mrs. Niwa got a sudden gleam in her eye. Kosuke almost expected her to start laughing maniacally. "Should we get it back? It would be the most exciting heist that Dark has ever done! Imagine the headlines! Dark Manages to Slip Into Unsuspecting Girl's Room!"

"Umm. . . Emiko, that doesn't exactly sound like the most flattering headline. . ."

"WHAT DO YOU MEAN IT DOESN'T SOUND FLATTERING? No, wait. . . Hmmm. . . You're right. It'll be embarrassing for Dark if anyone found out that he lost something he stole by simply dropping it! No, we'll get it ourselves. BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!"

Mr. Niwa watched her nervously. Sweat appeared on his forehead. Okay, she's lost it. . .

- - - - -

The next day came around nicely. The sun rose in a frenzy of gold, fiery orange, and autumn red. Not a cloud was in the sky, and the day's forecast according to channel 8 was 75º F with not one drop of cold rain or threat of blustery wind. Yes. A nice day.

But, as you've been told before, not everything is as it seems.

Emiko grumpily stalked through the halls, a pout on her face. Her father, Daiki, had convinced her not to steal the Feather back. "It could traumatize Risa. Dark should get it back himself anyway; straighten it all out himself." But even though Emiko was persuaded that that was the best thing to do, she didn't like it. She had been looking forward to her first personal crime streak.

She stopped before Daisuke's door and sighed. You can imagine the tears streaking down her face as she bit her lip. My opportunity. . . Gone!

After some time of calming down, she slammed her son's bedroom door open.

Daisuke was abruptly dragged back kicking and screaming from the land of dreams. He groaned and pulled his sheets up to cover his face.

"Daisuuuuuukeeeee! Ready for school?" Mrs. Niwa asked cheerfully, all signs of her sulking gone.

The redhead sniffed ad sat up in bed. He felt a lot better than he did last night. The pain had disappeared, leaving only a slight bruise on his right hand.

"Dark must have healed me overnight," he said.

"Good!" his mother replied. "Because you and Dark need to get back the Feather from Risa! Okay? Okay! Breakfast is ready! Hurry before it get's cold!" And with that, the door slammed shut again.

Daisuke winced. It was amazing that that side of the wall where his door was hadn't caved in yet.

"What was she talking about?" he asked himself in confusion.

Why couldn't his mother just calm down and explain things to him for once?

He sighed.

- - - - -

Daisuke was soon dressed and at the table for some breakfast. Grandpa was off visiting an old friend of his - he had said it was important - and Kosuke was out doing some errands, leaving just the redhead with his mother.

Today, breakfast was just oatmeal sprinkled with cinnamon and raisons. It was simple, but still very delicious.

In between mouthfuls, Daisuke decided to get an explanation out of his mother. "Mom?"

"Hm? Yes, Dai?"

"What in the world were you talking about this morning?"

She didn't answer right away. Instead, she asked, "Dai, what happened in the museum yesterday? I was so worried."

"Worried?"

"Yesterday, while you and Dark were at the museum, I couldn't shake off this feeling that something bad was going to happen. Something... dangerous to your life..."

Daisuke titled his head in thought. "To tell you the truth, I'm not sure what happened. Everything was fine at first," he said. 'Well, as fine as things can be when you're trying to steal something from a museum while being chased down by one of your friends.' He turned back to Emiko. "But then there was a fight. It wasn't a big one. Dark quickly knocked Satoshi out." He felt a bit guilty about that. "Then we tried to open the vault door, but we couldn't figure out the password," he added, embarrassed. (Imagine, two master thieves stumped by a simple code on a block of steel!) "Krad came out, and Dark resorted to using magic. I blacked out. After that, I woke up in bed."

"Hmmm. . ." His mother scratched her head, thinking.

"Well," she said after a while, "Your father and I ended up going to the museum. We saw Riku and Risa there." She paused, her eyes clouding over in confusion. "Something was happening... Something I fail to understand. It was all so strange. - Unreal…

"Poor Riku seemed scared out of her wits! Risa seemed to have lost focus on what was around her. She whispered Dark's name, then suddenly asked if he was okay, saying something was wrong. For a moment, before she turned back to normal and asked that, she seemed to be gazing at something far away. No, she seemed to be gazing inward, at something we can't see..."

Emiko abruptly lost her glazed look.

"Anyhow, after that, Krad and Dark flew by, and the Feather floated down to Risa. It isn't meant for her, is it? I'm almost sure that it isn't!"

Daisuke absorbed all of the information slowly. How strange... How strange that all these things could happen all in one night. Was it really leading up to something bigger like Emiko feared? Like he felt?

He thought back on all the events from last night. Had Dark mentioned anything about giving the Feather to Risa? No, he hadn't. And anyway, after all of the depression about Riku, Risa had been the last person on Dark's mind. Hmm...

Ah!

Daisuke remembered one last, vital fact.

When Daisuke had woken up for one split second, when Dark had grabbed the Feather Token, he had stopped breathing for a moment. Like the air in the room had suddenly dissipated, disappeared. And suddenly there was nothing to keep them conscious.

Dragged into darkness.

The fourteen-year-old furrowed his brows, relaying the information to his mother, excluding all the stuff about not being able to breathe of course. Emiko would have gone crazy.

"AH HA!" Mrs. Niwa slammed her hand on the table. "So it WASN'T meant for her! Great detective work, Daisuke! Great detective work!" By now, they had both finished their oatmeal. She stood up, a determined gleam in her eye. "Now that we know that Risa shouldn't be the one with the Feather Token, get to school and find out how you can steal that Feather back!"

With that said, Daisuke had barely enough time to grab his school bag before he was forcefully shoved out the door.

- - - - -

Daisuke found himself in front of Azumano Junior High several minutes later. He was quickly greeted by his friend, Takeshi Saehara, who ushered him to class as soon as their greetings had been exchanged.

The redhead was plopped into his seat in the already noisy classroom. Takshi's face came into view.

"Did you hear about it, Daisuke?"

Daisuke blinked. "Huh? Hear about what?"

Takeshi gaped at him. His expression was a cross between embarrassment for his friend's ignorance and astonishment that Daisuke really didn't know what he was talking about.

"You're kidding me, right? You didn't hear about it? It was all over the newspapers and the radio! You can't tell me that you didn't hear about it!"

Daisuke gave him a blank look. "Just spit it out."

Takeshi snorted.

"Well, last night's heist was Dark's longest one! He didn't come out 'till 9:30 last night! I know, cuz I was there! And the cops didn't really even see him - all they saw was a big blur. And it wasn't just him! There had been white feathers, too, which means that there must have been another guy with wings just like him! When the police checked out the vault, the vault door had been blown out, and there were scorch marks all over the room! What's even weirder - wait, is that even a word? - is that the Feather Token was gone, but there was dust all over the floor. It glowed, but as soon as they stepped into the room, the dust disappeared. Like WHAM! It was gone! Disappeared into thin air!"

Takeshi jumped up and down excitedly, then ran off to discuss the matter with their other classmates. No one in the room seemed to not be talking about it.

'Dust that disappears into thin air? What do you make of it, Dark?'

He received no answer.

'Hmmm. . . He's probably tired from last night,' Daisuke thought, shrugging off a strange, creepy feeling.

The redhead looked up for a moment and caught sight of blue hair across the room.

"Hey, Satoshi!"

The blue-haired boy gazed back at him. "I see that you got home safely," he said.

"Yeah. Were you the one that brought me home, Satoshi?"

There was a pause of silence before he received a nod in response.

"Thanks, Satoshi!" Daisuke gave him one of his huge happy-go-lucky smiles in appreciation.

Satoshi gave him another nod.

The shorter boy turned to go back to his seat, but the sound of Satoshi's voice stopped him. Daisuke turned around to face the older boy again, but he had bent his head to stare at his folded hands on his desk.

"Daisuke... Last night, when Krad attacked Dark with magic, and Dark grabbed the Feather Token, something strange happened. Dark seemed to freeze in midair. Then there was a flash of light, which lasted for only a split second. I . . . I don't know why, but the Feather gave me... the strangest feeling... I felt . . . fear. Amazingly, so did Krad. After that, we feared for our lives and fled. Krad was so frightened he was even willing to bring you and Dark home."

Satoshi paused and stared into Daisuke's eyes. Those icy orbs caused a chill to crawl down his spine as he saw the fear and concern over the Feather's fate in the older boy's eyes.

"So where is it?"

Daisuke gulped. Satoshi was not going to like this. . .


A/N: Okay, I'm not going to make any stupid excuse. I'm sorry. I was just lazy. That's why it took me so long to write chapter 5. DON'T KILL ME! (squeals and whimpers) Ahem. Anyway, I tried to write this one super long. I planned on writing more than this, but I discovered it would be too long. But it's long enough, right? And I did try to make it more descriptive. (I got a burst of inspiration because I realized I could write better if I only tried!) Anyway, I hope you liked this chapter. (I'm sorry, I was too lazy to proofread it more than once like I usually do. It's just too long for me to be patient with! Agh I sound so whiny. The summer is making me stupid... I'm babbling!) Ahem... And thank you SO MUCH for the reviews! It reached 50! Thank you!