CHAPTER TWO:

CHAPTER TWO: "Egypt Rome Pearl Harbor"

His hands were small as they held tight onto two stirring controls. A young voice called to him, full of youth and light. "They're coming in from the left!"

He soon found himself answering, despite an inner part of himself confused as to what was truly going on around him. "I see em!"

"Get em, Danny!"

That was his name, he knew that for sure but who was that boy talking to him like a best friend and brother would? He glanced up ahead, taking in a boy nearly the age of eleven. A wave of protective, brotherly emotion swept through at the sight of him. Immediately, a name popped into his mind as he replied, "I got em, Rafe!"

Danny found himself slipping deeper into this dream role he was in. Quickly finding himself playing fighter pilots with this Rafe kid that felt like a brother, like family, to him. He heard Rafe making the sounds of guns a blazing with his mouth, and soon he himself was copying the same noise with his own.

Everything about this felt so right so natural.

"He's behind us! Behind us! See him?" Rafe cried out to Danny.

"I see him, Rafe!"

He looked over Rafe's shoulder, and immediately sighed. RUDR? Rising up and over Rafe, he corrected his friend's spelling error. Placing the missing "D" and "E" in the word "rudder" that was written in chalk on their imaginary fighter plane dashboard.

Once back in his seat, Danny heard Rafe yell, "Bandits at two o'clock!"

"Power dive!" Danny quickly replied before slipping into his pilot role. Before he knew it, in his mind he had shot down the enemy plane. He even indicated the success by blowing an explosion through his cheeks.

"Good shooting, Danny!" Rafe's voice full of admiration.

"Good flying, Rafe!"

"Land of the free"

"Home of the brave!" Danny answered, feeling a sense of pride burst through him.

This emotion was incredible! Feeling one with this plane, this time, this place and with this "brother" of his. He regarded his surrounding for a brief moment, before focusing back on his adventure with Rafe. The sun was smiling down on them. As if blessing this day and this sacred time alone.

Even as the images began to fade, Danny never felt so alive and so complete than right here in this moment in this dream

"Danny!"

Land of the free

"Daniel!"

Land of the free

"Danny!" That voice seemed so far away, especially with Rafe's own calling him back.

Land of the free

"Home of the brave" Daniel Kawika Walker James murmured back to Rafe.

" Home of the brave'? Danny? Hey, Kawika!"

Danny bolted up right, his chest tight and palms sweaty as he regarded everything around him. He blinked his eyes, trying to register the face before him.

"Why g'morning sunshine!"

He recognized that sickly overly sweet voice before him. With no hesitation, he grabbed his pillow from behind and whacked his gal pal. Danny heard her giggle as she snatched the pillow from his grasp, giving him a few good whacks.

Daniel laid back on his bed, groaning in the dawn of this new day. Pulling his blanket over his head, "Go away, Meg!"

"No can do, surfer boy!" Meg flung the blanket up and away from Danny. Unfortunately, her grasp was too strong and fast, causing herself to remove the sheet entirely off Danny, and to reveal his whole sleeping entire. An entire that includes a tight white wife-beater and red briefs.

"Meghan!" Danny yelped as he realized how much of himself was revealed. Startled by that movement, he quickly reached for his pillows and covered the lower part of himself. He began to blush furiously as he noticed the shock look Meg was giving him, not to mention her first reaction at the sight of Danny. His Meg was notorious for always checking guys out. She would give men this semi-slow once over that was so entirely obvious. The fact that she had just done that to him caused Danny to momentarily freak out.

He also noticed that Meg began to turn crimson herself. She quickly looked away and held out the blanket for him to take back. "I'm so sorry, Danny" Meg apologized, eyes still averted from his gaze.

Danny snatched back the blanket, covering his body from the waist down. His own eyes were downcast, afraid to meet Meg's eyes.

"I'm really sorry, Danny." She said again, just as afraid to look at Daniel.

"Why—why did you come here, Meg?" He asked, clutching the white sheet tighter.

Meg began to pace, "I—I came here to because I just" A nervous laugh escaped her lips. "Oh man" Finally, she glanced up at Danny, wanting to meet his gaze. "Danny, I can't well, I just can't talk to you and not be able to look at you! I mean, this is silly! So I saw you in your underwear! Big deal!" A small shy smile played on her lips, "We used to take baths together, Danny. So I'm just guessing that your small package ain't so small anymore. This shouldn't be a problem for us! We're well, we're grown adults now, aren't we? Eighteen counts as being an adult right?"

Daniel nodded his head, his eyes slowly meeting Meg. An equally shy smile was on his face as he answered, "Yeah adults. This shouldn't be a problem for us, Meg."

They both fell into a somewhat awkward silence. Meg shuffled her right foot from side to side, while Danny allowed his gaze to fall back down.

Wanting to lighten the mood, Danny suddenly smiled mischievously at Meg. "And you're right, Meghan. Just like my uh, package not being so small now, I'm sure that your well, grapes ain't grapes no more." His eyes shifted onto her tight baby blue shirt with an exposed mid-drift. They landed momentarily on her chest area, then were averted to look up at Meg's shocked exterior.

Meg's jaw dropped at the realization over what Daniel had just said. "That ain't funny, James." She spoke as Danny fell back on his bed, chuckling over her stunned reaction.

When he wouldn't stop laughing, Meg jumped on him and began to wrestle with her best friend. "You stop laughing right now, Daniel! Or I swear to God that I'll beating the living shit out of you!"

"Meg!" He cried in between the fits of laughter. Danny knew that he could overpower her in a heartbeat, but this girl had a fighting spirit. He's seen first hand what could happen when Meg had both temper and determination within her and it was a damn scary thing!

"Okay! Okay! I give, Meg! Stop!" Daniel exclaimed, using his weight to turn Meghan over on her back. She was now slightly pinned, with Danny holding her down.

"Danny!" She squealed as he began to tickle her.

"I told you told you to stop but you wouldn't listen!" He continued to tickle her with no mercy. Only when he knew that she learned her lesson did he jump off of her.

"Jackass" Meg murmured as she tried to regain her steady breathing.

"Well," He reached into his dresser drawer, pulling out a pair of gray sweatpants. Once decently dressed, he sat himself down on his desk chair, also trying to steady his breathing. "Well, this jackass wants to know now why the hell you're here at" Danny glanced at his alarm clock, counting back a few minutes. "At around eight fifteen in the damn morning on a Saturday!"

Still playing along, "Well, jackass, I came over because I just found out from our fellow classmate, Natalie Casco, that Mr. Omiat decided on where to take us for his annual History Senior class trip."

Mr. Omiat was the Senior class history advisor. Every year he would take a few of his Senior students on a class excursion, all the while still giving them a history lecture of the significance of such a trip.

"So where is it this year? A return to Egypt for the third installment of The Mummy' trilogy? Or how about Rome for an encore of Crowe's Gladiator' performance?" Daniel smirked, unable to help himself with movie analogies.

"Pop quiz hotshot" Meg began, wanting to wipe that smart-alec grin off his handsome face. "It'll be exactly sixty years this December seventh since what infamous historic event?"

"Sixty years I know! That was the year that Mrs. Butt ugly bitch' Johnstone was born! Man, how could I have forgotten!" Danny joked, sneering at the thought of their so "beloved" high school Vice-Principal.

"Dork!" Meg threw a pillow at Danny, yet unable to hide her own laughter. "Actually, it'll be her fifty-ninth year this December."

"Shucks! One year off" Danny snapped his fingers, still grinning.

"No, seriously, Danny. Think back to our seventh grade history class"

"Do I hafta?" He whined, still joking with her.

"December seven, nineteen forty-one a date which will live in infamy'? Any of that ringing a bell for you?"

Daniel was about to tease Meg again when a sudden chill flew through him. A flash of explosions, bullets flying, blood, black oil, and screams indicating the end of all things innocent, appeared before his very eyes. He held tight onto his computer desk, wanting to steady himself at the sight before him. His breath quickened, his heart rate increasing as a dreaded fear fell upon him.

"Danny? Daniel?" He felt a hand grasp onto his shoulder, eyes brimming with love and concern. Her voice was so far away as his own eyes closed to view the horror before him.

"Get me into a damn plane, Danny!"

That voice screamed at him. A voice that sounded so new, yet so familiar.

Her voice returned, still sounding so far from him. "Danny? C'mon, Danny what's wrong?"

"Where are we going?" That voice again. Damnit! Why does that voice sound so familiar?

"You're scaring me, Danny. Please please, Danny what's wrong?"

He heard his own voice reply, but not to her. "Auxiliary field at Haleiwa, ten miles north of here!"

"Danny!"

His own eyes opened, finally seeing the woman with so much love, fear, and concern for him. Her eyes were brimming bright with tears, scared out of her mind. "Danny God, you scared me half to death! What happened?"

Daniel shook his head, groaning as a sudden rush fell on him. He closed his eyes once more, leaning himself forward for his hands to take his head within them. He felt Meg's hand stroke his back, while the other rested on his knee. He heard her trying to soothe him by humming a soft song and assuring him with sweet words.

Five words began to ring in his ears. Five words that held much somberness, respect, and dreaded memory. "The attack of Pearl Harbor." He whispered, meeting sad eyes with Meghan.

She nodded, her eyes just as painful at the reminder of the bleakest point in America's (and Hawaii's) history. "There's going to be a special memorial ceremony on Oahu, Friday, December seventh. It's going to be held at Pearl Harbor. Mainly on the USS Arizona Memorial." Her voice had also dropped to a soft whisper.

"That's two months from now," Danny spoke as he began to count the days. Slowly, realization dawned on him. "Mr. Omiat wants to take us to Oahu for that ceremony?"

Meg nodded again. "Yeah he feels that it this will be a special event. An honor and a privilege for us. And a lesson to be learned."

A sick knot formed in his stomach at the thought of visiting a place that seemed to cause an unexplainable fear in him. A big part of Daniel was confused as to why he dreaded visiting Pearl Harbor. Danny visited Oahu a couple of times in his lifetime yet thinking back, he recalled that the one place he always subconsciously refused to visit was the harbor itself.

"Danny what happened? You said you mentioned Haleiwa Haleiwa and an auxiliary field what were you talking about?" Meg was afraid for her best friend. When he had fallen away from her, his body trembling and holding onto his desk for dear life, Meg was frightened by his state. Frightened and confused.

"I don't know, Meghan." He honestly replied, apparent shock and fear in his voice. "All I do know I—I just can't can't go on this trip. I can't go to Oahu."

"Why not?" She took his hand safely into her hand.

"I can't explain it, Meg." Danny stared straight into her eyes, causing a stir in Meg's heart as she looked into his soul.

His eyes were weary. His soul looked so tired, so old for its eighteen years. Yet, Meg felt an uneasy feeling within her. It felt as if she was looking into another person's eyes, and not just her Danny's. Into another person's soul that was parallel to her Danny's.

"I can't explain it, Meg, but I'm afraid. I can't go to Pearl Harbor, Meghan. I just can't."

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