The lights buzzed weirdly, frantically. The air seemed whimsical, goofy at the moment, swirling in its own drunkenness while intertwining their cells within each other, mutating themselves into a metamorphic burst of extreme fantasy, a blistering of imagination. Hanabikai sat over the troubled body, watching him in his sleep, his rest, speaking to him through his thoughts as if he were there to listen, as if he had the ability to, and as if he were conscious. He had been sitting there for much too long; however, he couldn't think of a single thing to do if he got up. The walls seemed to relax, however, at the same time, remaining stiff, perfectly neutral so that it would not be discriminated; it would not be noticed for a difference in regularity. However, the fact that it was trying to hard to succeed that fact and capture it, made it a difference in expected normalcy.

The bed sheets covered up to the boy's chest, which failed to rise and fall in a long range of acknowledgment. His eyes were closed, calmly; his arms – frozen at his side, unalarmed, unstressed. For once they could rest; for once they did not have to protect every daring second of his and his friends' lives. It was as if they could not defend themselves; they had no arms. So he, happily, offered his arms to them. His lips were eerily still; they did not twitch in the slightest motion – he seemed so calm, so tranquil in his sleep, so at peace. Why didn't he seem like that regularly, when he was awake? Was something troubling him, without him even realizing it? Why don't people in the world ever look as calm or relaxed when they're sleeping, when they're away from the world? What makes them so happy, without even realizing their own presences? What was so great about that?

Kahibi Eric remained in his stationary position on that flat, comfortable bed of blatant color white; it was as if he had been suspended in the round cycle of second and hour, the loophole of which we knew as darkness, light, happiness, sadness, madness, insanity, sanity, holiness, undead, reality, fantasy, life, and death. Hanabikai sighed, thoughts flooding his mind, pulling him to the non-lasting brink of life, brink of sanity that he soon found himself on the edge of. He ticked his tongue slightly, comfortably. He wondered when he would come back. Come on, Eric, he thought. Give us another miracle. He watched his features, waited for a reaction as if he knew the Minor heard him, even with the absence of voice, he heard him. There was no twitching. There was no moving. There was no noticeable breathing. There was no reply.

Then, as if answering for him, there was a knock at the door; a dead, solid knock that seemed too eerie to be human, too deep to be weak. Hanabikai cocked his head up as his eyes widened just a bit; he seemed alarmed. Then, returning back to his norm, he waited, sensing, feeling, watching the door behind him without turning, just touching its presence ever so slightly so that he knew what was happening, and what had happened. His brown hair remained stiff; he waited for the slow creaking of the door. And it came. It came to succeed its promise that Hanabikai knew it would.

The low moan of false despair creased the air, cracked it from suspense and replacing it with a thicker one; a deeper one, a more impermeable one. Darkness lurked in sneakily, obviously. A slice of a figure, a strip of a silhouette showed scarcely. Then, it was a step into the room, a click of wooden slippers against the hard paved floor. The figure waited. Hanabikai did the same; he decided to. One would soon talk. Which one?

"Tsukansu," Hanabikai started without turning to find his closest friend a few feet away from him, standing behind him secretly, as if disloyally. "You're back already?" he asked peculiarly with a short, comfortable smile.

Tsukansu laughed in reply; his voice was hoarse, a bit tired. "You sound as if you don't want me here," he noted.

Hanabikai smiled at the thought. "No, that's not it," he answered. "So, how was your trip?" he intended to change the subject, speaking metaphorically, suspiciously.

"Decent," was Tsukansu's one-word answer, voice gruff and blatant.

"Man of few words as always," the sitting council joked.

Tsukansu gave a short chuckle, just slightly so that it remained comfortable, easy. "How did they do?" he referred to the Minors.

"Fine," his friend answered. "This one over here snuck out for the sake of his friends," he referred to Eric. Their attention turned to him quickly, swiftly. Their eyes almost pierced him; however, he could not be permeated. "He's going to need resting until the afternoon or so," he informed.

"I see," Tsukansu answered bluntly.

"When are they expecting us?" Hanabikai asked, changing the subject once more. There was a brief silence.

"Sometime during the next day," Tsukansu figured hoarsely; he spoke without emotion, without enthusiasm, as if he had been on a strict no-caffeine and sugar break for a month.

"When shall we -" Hanabikai was cut off.

"Later," he snapped lowly.

"You seem rather cold, lately," Hanabikai informed. "Has your own misunderstanding self come back?" he provoked. Tsukansu sighed. He shut his eyes for a while, feeling himself, as if he had lost himself as well; he knew what Hanabikai meant. The question remained, was he doing it on purpose?

"I'm sorry," Tsukansu apologized. "It's not that," he assured. "It's just…" he let himself trail off.

"You're worried, too," Hanabikai finished for him. Tsukansu picked his head up in awareness. "Aren't you?" he insisted. "About those two?" he continued. Tsukansu said nothing; his lips remained sealed, his thoughts remained uninitiated. "It's not just me."

"How can I not?" Tsukansu sighed exasperatedly, this time with more emotion, friendlier.

"It's okay. I'm sure everything will be all right," Hanabikai assured without proof, without belief in his own words. The fantasy air continued to swirl; it now pooled outside in escape. "Let's hope so," he spoke with exception. Tsukansu nodded in agreement. No words made them feel better. None. At all.

PoVS

His footsteps echoed on for miles, deep, thorough miles that never let a trace of it become unnoticed of it; it was too dominative almost, too… selfish, if you could call them that. The darkness ate away at them, sucking them in into greedy eternity of life, egotistic reality of hate, of death, of vamp being and murky blustering. His footsteps continued, mindlessly, daringly towards the end of the hall. He did not know where he was going. All he knew was that he had to go somewhere, at least, somewhere farther away, from his own reality. However, the more he walked, it seemed as if the more he got closer to it, and not farther away from it. And without contemplation, he continued anyway, disregarding it out of his own good, while a sliver of his own conscience believed that he should just stop a moment, think, and rationalize.

The darkness paved no sighted way for him, it was full of disease, unhealthiness contaminated into one container that would not let it out, and was kept hidden in the shadows at the sides, while the boy just walked past each shadow, each sliver of disease, death and cease, which, as if it weren't enough, infected with even more virus, more pain, agony, hell. Nevertheless, the boy kept walking, half-mindedly, halfheartedly; he knew not of where he was headed. He just knew he was headed… somewhere. Would he die? No, what kind of a wild hallucination of a question was that? It was completely blown out of proportion. Things were not as bad as they seemed – to him. They were just simply carried away; they were just simply brought away from his imagination and distorted into nightmare fear. He just had to wake up. He did not know of how to.

Kokori Dylan kept his pace down the hall which he barely sensed; he never knew when he reached a corner. He just waited until he felt a wall's bosom before him, or the threshold of a door. Even then, he would not walk through the door; it seemed as if he as too scared, too un-daredevil to do so. Then, out of his extreme insanity and cloudy-mindedness, came a thought, an idea of some sort. It was an obvious idea; he scolded himself of not thinking of it earlier and ending his frantic gestures of nervousness, of timid coy. As he did, he brought life to his fingers, danced them about and trickled them against the air as sparks, flashes of light began to conceive from between them, the friction. They were like tiny, distant stars sewn into the fabric of his turning, twisting, sprinkling fingers. They began to wrap around them, then around his hand, bringing life to this darkened hall, bringing light to the suspenseful road. The light wrapped around his hand, until it became a device useable, a utensil of his will, a piece of equipment handheld for him and him only.

The walls were now visible; the ceiling was now seen. Corners were not, however, but the ends of roads and curves and turns and thresholds were now available to vision. Dylan felt a large lift of burden off of his back, a huge wave of relief coming over him and comforting him, touching into him, tapping into his soul. Shadows burst from him and engulfed by his own light, until nothing remained but his own luminary, hopeful presence. He continued his venturing through the dimension. He had not of an idea as to where he was, where he had come from, or, of course, where he was headed. He was indefinitely lost.

He turned the corner. Where am I headed? He thought. Am I going to die? Am I headed for danger? Or am I headed for a prize; am I going the right… way? Am I an existence? His sanity wore away along with the eroded darkness. The bright light glowered hotly against the side of his cheek; it was a bit comforting at the least. His emerald eyes stared on; they could not pierce anything, despite their childish beauty. Now, these childish beauties were nothing but filled with concern of his own good self. Am I a good existence? Am I real? Or am I just a small… single… feeling; something just felt, just tingled for a moment's notice, and then forgotten by the next day? Am I something real? Do I mean something real; what do I mean what? Surely, it was time for him to be commited.

Then, he looked to the walls, as if they would give him the answer. In a way, they did. Along the walls, there were brilliant trails of faded paint, slapped on by a mop of fingers, obviously by someone, something. Dylan gulped, nervously. He looked to the opposite wall; there, too, laid many trails of paint, many waves and wisps of fingered color swirling around there with life, pulsing with reality. Then, he looked to the floor. There was a bright whirling color. Yes, everywhere, there was dried paint. It smelled of it, too; it was recent. Where had this paint come from? Was Dylan truly hallucinating now? Was he now really ready to be commited?

He continued to walk, to venture through the hall of paint. Soon, he found a collage of paintings, painted and portrayed against the walls as if a gallery. The paint smudged everywhere, each one taking millions of strokes and hours of hard work. There were good pictures, signs of holiness, and signs of good feeling. Then, there were horrid ones, gory ones. They represented everything around us – happiness, sadness, formality, disappointment, guilt, innocence, framing, blackmail, darkness, light, the universe, knowledge, money, selfishness, respect, religion, discrimination – everything that had to do with what the world was… what a life was for a human being. Smudges of orange wall hinted through the paintings, blindly painted over.

"Amazing," Dylan whispered to himself in secrecy. The paint was still wet; he made sure he did not step on any paintings to ruin their fine effort. "Who did this…?" he whispered once more. It would've been obvious, despite the fact that he wasn't doing so well in the head at the moment. Or, was he just one of the few that didn't… know… of it? Maybe. He would find out soon, anyways.

"What the hell…?" he turned to a certain picture of a black hole, and swirling faces, many recognizable faces that he didn't know where they were from but included him as well into it, distorting themselves around it. There were many sand particles; there was a sun inside as well. Then, there shot a sharp needle through the air and against the wall behind him. Dylan dodged out of the way quickly, sensing it just barely as it zoomed through the air, glowing from the light he had created himself. He looked to the needle, glimmering. He gulped. Who had sent that needle?

Among the shadows, there was a being of life. Gloves stained with paint showed through. A crooked smile, a friendly one, too. "Hello, Dylan," said the voice. Dylan turned around, wide-eyed. "Welcome to my world," the boy welcomed.

"Who are you?" Dylan muttered as he stepped closer, narrowing his eyes slightly. He couldn't see the boy's face; just the body and his concealing gloves.

"Wha-" he said with shock, friendlily in his teenage voice. "Dylan – are you joking?" he said with certain self-pity. Dylan blinked. He squinted his eyes. Then he recognized the boy – and scolded himself for not recognizing him sooner.

"Oh, sorry, sorry," Dylan said nervously, apologizing. He chuckled off the embarrassment. It kept coming back to shoot him in the face. "Sorry, Lance!" he apologized. The boy seemed angry, fuming slightly. Then he got over it. "Lance, what did you do to this place?" he asked now, less humiliated.

"Refined it; made it my own," he answered friendlily now.

"Why?" Dylan asked out of piqued interest.

"Just felt like it," Lance said passionately. "Why; is that a crime?"

"No, no, not at all!" Dylan sang respectfully. He chuckled in his own returning embarrassment.

"Listen," Lance insisted. "About yesterday…" he began. "What do you think happened?" he sighed. His voice seemed sad, sympathetic for himself as well.

"What do you mean?" Dylan asked. "Things happen in life."

"No, I mean…" Lance spoke with exception. "What do you think happened yesterday? What do you think happened to Jeremy? How do you think he got to be like… like that?" he asked with a stammering, nervous voice.

Dylan seemed to hesitate for his reply. He traced his fingers over the square-bandaged cheek. He sighed deeply. He didn't know what to say. Lance did the same, though he had no injuries – he had dodged each attack by detecting details. Dylan, however, on the other hand, could not. "Honestly… I don't know. Maybe…" It was no use. Dylan couldn't answer the question.

"Maybe White Cloak did it?" Lance suggested.

"What?" Dylan thought the idea was preposterous. "What do you mean White Cloak? What would he want with Jeremy? His target is Utopia; or, in other words, us!" Dylan thought that the idea of the goal was ironic comparing to what the man was doing at the moment – probably thinking of what to do next.

"Come on, it's possible, Dylan!" he scolded. "Think about it. White Cloak- he even injured one of the backups, bypassing some serious security the Council must've set up!" Dylan remained silent. "Come on, Dylan! It would've been just as easy for him to get to Jeremy as well; even more evidence provides the time Jeremy started his bursting. It was right after White Cloak had visited! Don't you think that's a bit suspicious?"

"I don't know, Lance, I really don't know," was all Dylan could say, avoiding eye contact. "Maybe he did do it. But can we really know for sure?"

"No…" Lance said calmer this time. Dylan looked to the boy; they both stared into each other's eyes. "But I just…" Lance's voice began to break a bit. "I just want something to believe in…" he said with a sniffing, crackling voice. Dylan said nothing; he retorted nothing. He just looked sympathetic. And Lance brought his glove, paint-splotched hands to his face, while Dylan just fell to the ground. He ticked his tongue in thought. They stayed there. For a long time.