It was a figurine with demon wings, a tail and horns, but an angelic face, long wavy hair and a peaceful smile. It had been hewn into marble, polished to perfection and its empty eyes were forever looking at the people passing by. It seemed almost alive to Daisuke as he studied it. He didn't need to read the small card inside the case to know what it was.
The Guardian. A piece of Hikari family history that they had tracked down in the last few months. Both had been surprised to discover that the museum in Daisuke's home town was about to display the real thing. Like all art it was filled with a life of its own, feeding off the adoration and wonder of the people around it, creating its own soul. It wasn't truly dangerous, but it still needed to be sealed.
"It's beautiful," Daisuke murmured. "Your family had a talent."
Satoshi touched the small of his back, smiling a little. "A talent that turned into a curse."
Daisuke gave him a sad smile. "Yeah. Too bad. At least this one isn't too active yet. We can seal it easily."
There was a faint throb and he blinked.
"I'll check on it again," Satoshi said, though his voice sounded suddenly far away, as if he was distancing himself from Daisuke while still standing right next to him.
Another pulse. This time deeper, touching something never forgotten. It broke open a barely scabbed wound. Daisuke winced.
"Dai?"
He blinked and found himself looking directly into the dark blue eyes of his lover. Worry creased the smooth features.
"Daisuke? What's wrong?"
A ripple made him gasp and he grabbed his chest. "Dark!" he exclaimed harshly.
He felt it. Like he had felt Dark before. It was the same sensation as the time the kaitou had first initiated the change. It was a tearing, a hot burning flame across his nerves, but instead of the soothing presence that had come out of the awakening, there was only more rippling.
"Daisuke!" Satoshi exclaimed as he cried out in pain.
Light washed over him, tearing into him, splitting him apart.
"DARK!"
The world around him was strange, surreal, like in a dream. This wasn't
a dream though. It was reality – at least in a way. He had been to such
worlds before. Worlds hidden inside paintings, works of art… worlds that
were born from human wishes and beauty and emotions, magic given form by
humanity.
There was no beauty here, though. It was bland, almost completely gray.
There were shapes in the distance but none he could really define. The
ground was hard, unrelenting, rocky.
And he wasn't alone.
"No, don't come any closer!"
It was a hoarse moan, a plea to listen, but he couldn't. Just hearing
the voice…
Daisuke looked at the being he hadn't seen or heard in over six years.
He had lost Dark before he had turned sixteen, had lost a part of himself
to the Black Wings where everything had come from.
Six years.
Dark hadn't changed. He still looked the same.
Of course, back then he hadn't been injured as badly as he was now.
Daisuke couldn't think of a time he had ever seen Dark bleed. It had been
his own body that had bled and hurt when bruised and cut. Dark had been
him; part of him. Part of his very soul.
"Dark."
It wasn't a question. He just had to say his name, hear it out loud.
So much time, such loneliness inside his head where another voice had
been before. Of course, that voice had not always been wanted, but he had
accepted it over time. He had accepted and started to tolerate the annoying
comments, but there had also been advise, conversation between the two
so different beings that went beyond a host and his… symbiote? Was that
what it had been? A symbiosis? Brought forth by whatever had born Dark?
Not a curse… just a co-existence.
Dark had become part of him, of his life. He had been an integral part
and that had been ripped out of him. They had been one. One being… Now
he had found the missing piece once more.
"Stop, Daisuke!" Dark begged, the violet eyes boring into his own brown
ones. "Don't!"
There was a chuckle that seemed to ring through the air around them
and Daisuke looked for its source. He found nothing. All he saw was this
strange world, made up like a prison, with Dark lying on the ground, bruised,
battered, mangled… torn and bleeding. Pain was etched into the youngish
features, the eyes speaking of a torment that had started long ago. His
wings lay limply across his back, the black feathers spilling like frozen
water over the ground.
Why was he winged?
Why did the wings look… broken?
Daisuke stepped even closer, drawn to his former partner like a moth
to the flame. It was like hearing a call for help, silent and insistent.
He felt Dark's presence, felt his own react with a yearning to merge with
his partner again.
"He can't but come to you, Dark," a voice laughed. "He and you… his
blood answers your call."
"No!" Dark screamed, trying to get up.
Blood clung to his body, his hands, his hair.
With a soft gasp, the dark-haired man collapsed, eyes squeezed shut.
"No," he whispered. "No, no, no… please…"
It sounded like a prayer, like a plea… for help in Daisuke's ears.
"You and I," Dai said softly, "we're one. I know that. You know it.
You are me, I am you. We are one person."
Dark violet eyes cracked open, gazing at him through small slits. "He
called you here," Dark moaned. "He wanted this…"
"No, I came here because you needed me. Because I needed that part
of me back. We're a unity, Dark."
Daisuke's voice was soft, calm, and there was a faint smile on his
lips.
Dark gritted his teeth and gathered the last of his strength, trying
to get up, but whatever his intentions had been, they were thwarted by
crackle of lightning and the energy that hit him.
He screamed.
Daisuke's eyes widened. "Dark!"
Tendrils of smoke rose from the mangled back, from the wings that looked
partly charred. A whimper escaped the tortured man.
"Who are you?!" Daisuke demanded. "Why do you hurt him?"
Laughter again. "Because I can?"
Daisuke's hands curled into fists.
"He's a weak creature, Niwa," the voice went on. "Weak and without
a host body, without a Tamer. An accident, actually. He and his other half
are an accident. A ritual gone wrong. They shouldn't exist."
"But he does!"
"Yes, and he has learned to feel and to love and to be close to his
host. So very intriguing," the voice chuckled. "Each part of the other
but oh so very different. Each representing the family they were forced
upon. In the end both lost their wings, so to speak. They returned to where
they had come from. Why not have some fun with him and his likeness now?
How the mighty have fallen…"
Daisuke's eyes were drawn to the frozen form of the second magical
being trapped in here. Krad's body appeared relatively unharmed, but he
was frozen in his place. No longer dressed in his white, flowing robe,
he was stripped down to a pair of dirty pants and a stained shirt. His
white wings were stretched out behind his back, held at such an unnatural
angle it had to hurt. The golden eyes were narrow slits, filled with pain
that showed that he had fallen victim to the same thing that had trapped
Dark. The long, blond hair was matted, fell limply, but he seemed to have
some fight left in him, struggling now and then.
"You're torturing him for your fun!" Daisuke accused.
"What's it to you, boy? You were rid of him."
"Then why bring me here to watch?"
Laughter. "No, you came on your own. You heard his call."
"Dai…" Dark whispered. "Leave. Please. Leave!"
He stopped beside the broken form, secretly scared and horrified by
the state his friend was in. Dark had always been strong, almost invincible,
a magical creature that resided inside him, that healed and could not be
killed.
Finally he knelt down and stretched out his hand.
"I can't. You and me, don't you understand? Neither can leave… alone."
Daisuke raised his head, staring at the nothingness. "Am I right?"
There was no answer, but the sky darkened.
Dark tried to move away, too weak to do much more than flinch a little.
Violet eyes begged him not to do it, not to touch him, to leave the bond
broken.
"I'll always be with you," Daisuke murmured, recalling those words
like they had just been spoke. "I am inside you."
His fingers closed around a bloody wrist. Dark stared at him like hypnotized.
His sweat-glistening features, so pale and haggard, held an expression
of wonder.
"We'll be all right… we're together," the human whispered.
For a moment there was nothing, then Dark's eyes widened, his mouth
opened as if to scream. Suddenly his form seemed to flow apart. It turned
black as night, with the consistency of oil, flowing, twisting and turning.
Tendrils of black struck out, latching onto Daisuke, embracing him, wrapping
themselves around the young man. Daisuke's eyes closed, his face suddenly
twisted as if in pain, then the brown eyes shot open and a cry escaped
his lips as the oily substance splashed toward him. It flowed into him
like a liquid mist.
'I won't forget about you either. I never will.'
All those feelings, all those emotions came back to him, inside the
Black Wings, the final stage.
Daisuke screamed.
He relived everything, from the decision to enter this fight, to bear
the pain alone, to the moment Dark and Krad had collided, healing the Black
Wings and returning to the eternity that had given form to them.
He saw memory flashes that weren't his. Of the darkness, the light,
of the presence merging with his own, sealing them both inside the final
piece of Hikari artwork that had ever been created by the mad family. It
all flowed together with the dead form of Satoshi's stepfather, lying broken
and bleeding on the ground, with feathers whirling around him, with magic
at the rampage. Everything became one.
Another scream ripped from his mouth.
Daisuke had felt this terrible pain before, the pain of transformation,
and it was as familiar to his body and mind as was the presence that now
finally touched him again. He welcomed the agony as it also reunited him
with a part he had missed so dearly.
Dark> he whispered.
He curled up, wings falling over his back, covering him… them.
Dark>
He was back.
Back where he belonged.
We're together again>