Sakura ran as fast as she could, terrified. "We're not going to make it!" she panicked.
"Hush!" Meta Knight reproved, flying immediately above her. "We must stay strong for the young ones!"
She gulped and nodded. Kirby tugged at her Dimensional Cape as they ran, sheer terror on his face. "Scary boss, poyo," he whimpered.
"We're going to be okay," she reassured him, trying to reassure herself as well.
Suddenly the ground fell out from under them. She tried to turn her cape into wings, but it wouldn't change. She was falling, and so were Bandana Dee and Kirby, and there was nothing she could do about it. She yelled up to Meta Knight for help, but there was nothing he could do either. They were somehow falling too fast for him to catch up.
Closing her eyes, she reached a hand out to both of her falling companions, and they all three braced for the landing.
Sakura woke up with a quiet scream. She calmed down some when she realized she had just fallen off her shelf onto the library floor, but she was still really upset.
There was a crash of thunder and bright lightning. It could just be a regular storm, she reasoned nervously. But then, why had she had a nightmare? Regular storms didn't interfere with the Fountain of Dreams.
She used her cape, which was, of course, working just fine, to fly back up to her shelf. After trying to go back to sleep and failing miserably, she grabbed her sword and held it up, causing it to give off a soft light. She had had a feeling it would be able to do that, Galaxia could. "You're a pretty cool sword, Cherry Star," she whispered to it as she flew back down from her shelf and walked out of the library.
All was silent as she patrolled the castle, but she had a feeling she wasn't the only one up. This was confirmed when she saw Blade and Sword nervously pacing at the gate, standing guard. "Oi! Ung naf sakra uppen?" Blade grunted as he saw her.
Sword translated, "He says, 'Oi! Why is you up?'"
"Couldn't sleep," she replied, shaking her head. "What about you guys?"
Sword shrugged. "Just 'bout the same, Miss. Standin' guard cause Mety-Knight told us to."
"Is he up?" she inquired.
"No, I'm thinkin' he's in his room. Maybe not asleep, though." Sword shrugged again.
"Well, thank you for the information," she finished, then bowed a bit.
"Welcon narfiff molk, oi," Blade agreed, and bowed back.
Rolling her eyes as soon as Blade couldn't see her, she continued patrolling. It was funny how, even though Meta Knight himself was so eloquent, one of his sidekicks had poor grammar and the other wasn't even understandable.
At first, everything seemed normal, aside from the storm, of course. But the closer she got to the to the Waddle Dees' section of the castle, the more she sensed a feeling of sadness and fear. It couldn't be just the storm causing it, Waddle Dee pretty much loved all varieties of weather, so what could it be?
She anxiously entered the Waddle Dee sleeping area when she came to it, finding all the Waddle Dee up and jumping around urgently. "What's wrong?" she asked. Moving out of her way, the Waddle Dee cleared a path to a young Waddle Dee who was obviously very sick, its cheeks not giving off their normal healthy glow.
"Oh, you poor thing," she whispered caringly. She turned and ordered one of the Waddle Dee, "Go get Meta Knight!" It just shook its head in fear. "Please. This little one needs help. I promise no harm will come to any of you." The Waddle Dee shook its head again, but a couple of the others seemed to convince it. It grabbed a torch and hurried off into the dark hallways.
She pulled her cape off and carefully wrapped it around the little thing, then picked it up and rocked it in her arms. "It's going to be all right, sweetheart," she whispered to it, then, touching its forehead to hers, she started mentally singing a lullaby in the Waddle Dee language. This seemed to calm it down some. The others apparently heard it through the little one's mind, because they relaxed a bit too.
Meta Knight soon arrived. "What is the matter?" he asked urgently.
"This little one is sick," she explained sadly.
He took a close look at it. "I am afraid it is too late." He shook his head, his eyes a dark blue of sadness. "There is nothing we can do for it."
Tears appeared in her eyes. "No," she disagreed. "That can't be true." She set the young Waddle Dee down, still wrapped in her cape, and thought for a moment. Suddenly, a look of hope came into her eyes. "I must be able to help. There's something I can do."
"I am sorry, Sakura, but there is not. It is over," Meta Knight disagreed gently, putting a hand on her shoulder, but she didn't listen. Holding her hands close to each other, she started to form a ball of soft light. This pink light glowed soothingly as she pulled her hands apart slowly, causing it to get a bit bigger. Everyone, including herself, stared at the light, wondering what it could be. After a moment, she gently touched the light to the tiny Waddle Dee's face, and it seemed to absorb in and disappear. At first, nothing happened. Then, the little one went completely still.
Angrily, several Waddle Dee rushed at her, obviously thinking what had just happened was somehow her fault. But, seconds later, the young Waddle Dee's eyes opened and it hopped happily up onto its feet, as if nothing had ever been wrong with it. After cheerfully clambering up to its spot on the shelves, it fell peacefully asleep. The others, amazed, soon followed suit.
"How did you do that?" Meta Knight asked, astonished. "You saved it, when it was done for!"
"I don't know," she replied, happy but sounding a bit weak. "I just had this instinct that I needed to do that, that it would help it." Half-shrugging, she added, "Maybe it's a motherly-instinct-type thing. Don't girls have something like that?"
He frowned thoughtfully to himself. "Come," he ordered, swishing around. He swiftly led her to his bedroom, where he took a birdcage off a shelf and set it on a table. "This is Chirp," he explained.
"You have a pet bird named Chirp?" she asked incredulously. "I still find it hard to believe that you like cookies, much less that you have a pet bird. And it's named Chirp, of all things. Why not Warrior or something?"
"That is not important," he shushed her. "What is important is the fact that Chirp has never been able to fly. That is why I have been caring for him these past several months, after his mother abandoned him. I think there is something wrong with his wings."
"Oh, poor birdie!" she said sadly, as he opened the cage and it hopped out onto the table. Its small, beady eyes shining, it looked at her curiously.
"I want you to see if you can heal him, like you just did with the Waddle Dee," he told her, his eyes glowing a curious deep green.
"All right," she nodded. Making another sphere of light, she gently let it grow bigger, then touched it to the bird. Nothing happened for a moment, but suddenly, Chirp spread his wings and flew around the room several times as the Kirby Dee and the Star Warrior watched in amazement. True to his name, the little bird let out a happy chirp. She 'smiled.' "I did it. He's all better!" she yawned, tired. It was late, and those healing powers seemed to use a lot of energy.
Meta Knight's eyes glowed a content blue, not noticing her fatigue yet. He held out his hand, which the bird landed in and chirped again. Gently putting it back in its cage, he told it, "As soon as the weather gets better, I will let you go free." The bird whistled a happy tune, then, putting its head under its wing, it went to sleep.
"That was amazing. I have never heard of a Star Warrior with those powers," he told her excitedly. Well, excitedly for him, which still was extremely calm and controlled.
"I'm not exactly a Star Warrior. I'm a Kirby Dee. I don't think those are quite the same thing," she reminded him. "And I've never had light in my hands before, but I've always had a knack at helping those who are small, hurt, or sick. It's why I spent so much of my time in the nursery. Well, until the last few months before I changed," she finished mournfully. Sitting down against the wall, she yawned again. "Those powers seem to take a lot of energy."
"Are you all right?" he asked, concerned now that he noticed how tired she was.
"Yeah," she replied, her eyes a bit droopy. "It's late, that's most of the problem. I'll be just... fine."
There was a tap at the door, and in came a trio of Waddle Dee. One handed her back her cape, another gently placed a ribbon that looked like a cherry blossom on her head, while a third handed her a bowl of cherries and touched its forehead to hers. "You have served us," it thought to her. "We have served you."
"I have served you," she agreed aloud. "You have served me." The Waddle Dee pulled back, and she traded a blank stare with the three of them before they left again.
"What was the significance of that?" Meta Knight asked in curiosity.
After eating a cherry or two, she explained, "The Waddle Dee don't ever leave debts unpaid for long. I healed their little one, they paid me back. 'I have served you, you have served me,' is basically the Waddle Dee equivalent of saying 'thank you, you're welcome.'"
Nodding in understanding, he inquired, "Then why do they stay with DeDeDe? He does not ever serve them in return."
She nodded. "I think way back at the beginning, DeDeDe accidentally hammered some sort of monster that was torturing us, during one of his hissy fits. In thanks, the Waddle Dee became his servants. And since they're provided with a place to stay, food to eat, and something to do, they stick around. I've never been able to understand their level of patience, though." She blinked her eyes rapidly a few times, trying to stay awake. "It's storming," she commented, trying her best to stay conscious. "Really badly, too. Is the monster here yet?'
"I do not think so, but he is definitely very close," Meta Knight informed her. "Now, you need to return to your bed. You need to be rested for the time to come."
"Yes, sir," she agreed blearily, then left.
He thought she made it back to the library, but he found her the next morning sleeping inside a bookshelf just down the hall. "The poor thing really had been exhausted," he murmured compassionately, and he let her sleep all day.
The next day, she awoke early in the morning. Hopping down from this bookshelf, she tried to remember where she was. As soon as she did, she found her sword and cape down on the floor where she had left them, along with an empty bowl.
Inside the bowl was a poorly-yet-adorably drawn picture of Kirby and Bandana Dee eating the cherries, signed "Thanks, poyo!" in cherry juice. She shook her head in amused annoyance. "Those two," she sighed. She felt her head and discovered the ribbon shaped like the flower she was named after was still there. Using a foggy window as a mirror, she decided she wanted to keep it there. It looked nice. While she was at the window, she observed that it wasn't storming anymore, but it was very dark and cloudy outside. It looked nearly as dark as night. Darkness such as Dreamland has never known, she remembered, and shivered.
"Good morning," Meta Knight said, appearing out of nowhere.
"Hello," she replied, putting her cape on and her sheathed sword in its place. After a year of knowing him, she was used to his sudden appearances.
"I know that even though you cannot talk to the Waddle Dee, you can still sense them. No one can find any of them anywhere, ever since the night you helped them. Can you tell where they are?" he asked urgently.
She looked at him in surprise. "How long have I been asleep?"
"Just all of yesterday," he assured her.
She shook her head and sighed. "I'm sorry." Then she closed her eyes, searching for the Waddle Dee. "No, I can't sense any of them. They're gone."
He turned away and asked himself quietly, "Where could they have gone to?"
Opening her eyes, she was about to answer, but just then Kirby and Bandana Dee ran down the hall to them, looking like they'd seen a ghost.