Takeshi stared at the tape.

The very last tape he had at the moment.

All the rest were sold on e-bay, lost or burned by Takeshi's grandmother.

But this one was the most important to him.

"I've got to erase the footage," Takeshi said, gulping through his tears as he slipped it into the video camera for erasage. "Come on… you've got to make yourself do this. For Satoshi. Because if you do this, you'll get into the cool group. Yeah. And Satoshi will think you're awesome. Okay. Yes. I'm going to do this. I'm going to press the erase button." His finger wavered above the shining red button of doom hesitantly.

"Stop talking to yourself," said Takeshi's younger sister, Wendy. She was playing with some metallic silly putty and trying to see if she could touch her tongue to her nose. "Can't you just get this over with so we can go out for ice cream? Don't forget: you promised."

"Quiet, Wendy," said Takeshi seriously. He stared at the tape, the beloved tape with the sacred footage. He burst into tears. "I CAN'T DO THIS!!!"

"Now I know what I'm getting you for Christmas: a life." Wendy sighed and grabbed the camera. "Here, I'll just delete it th-"

"NOOOO!" Takeshi snatched the camera back. "Wendy, you don't know what this is. You don't know what I had to do to get this!"

Wendy threw her silly putty up in the air and it stuck to the ceiling. She growled, and then turned back to her "incommodious" brother. "Well, if it's so important, than just keep it. The painting thief dude is gonna be all over TV anyway, so what's the big deal?"

"Wendy, you don't know anything. You're only six." Takeshi stared at the tape, ignoring Wendy's arguments that she was nine. It was his prized possession and had taken him forever to get, not to mention, it was extremely difficult to tape as well. He had hidden in a tree for twelve hours wearing all black Spandex on the hottest day in July just to get three minutes and forty seven seconds of Daisuke's mom mowing the lawn.

"And those were the greatest three minutes and forty seven seconds of my life," Takeshi said proudly.

"Pardon?"

"Never you mind, Wendy." Takeshi grinned. "Forget Satoshi. I'm going to keep the tape. It's my favorite."

"You do that."

Suddenly, the silly putty stuck to the ceiling unfortunately decided that now of all times it would loosen and fall from the ceiling. Right before Takeshi could take out the tape.

And right onto the red button of doom.

REWIND. Click! DELETE.

Takeshi could do nothing but stare. Wendy stared, too, but not awe-struck.

"Well," she stated flatly after a few moments. "I suppose that takes care of that little problem."

She walked off to go buy some ice cream by herself, even though she wasn't allowed, as her brother continued to stare with face frozen in a look of utter shock.

"MOM!" Daisuke ran downstairs. "MOM! MOM! MOOOOOOOOM!"

"No need to shout, we're in the same room," said Daisuke's mom, grinning.

"My hair is purple and I'm tall and my hair purple and I'm ugly and my hair is purple!" Daisuke complained. "And the worst part is, my hair is PURPLE!"

"Yeah, we caught that," said Daisuke's mom sarcastically yet brightly. "And don't say you're ugly. I think you're quite pretty."

"Mom… this is your son you're talking about."

"So? It's my job to embarrass and love you."

"Okay, off topic. You don't seem too phased by this, so I'm going to have to ask grandpa," said Daisuke. If worse came to worse, he always turned to his grandfather. Like if he wanted ten bucks, though he usually only got a monologue about "the old days" or something relevant to that, which he didn't pay attention to.

"Hmm… lessee now… purple hair... this must mean it's your fourteenth birthday…" Daisuke's grandpa said, sipping his tea.

"Uh… yeah," Daisuke said, nodding. "But do you think you could help-"

"Shoot, I thought it was his twelfth birthday." Daisuke's mom snapped her fingers at their lack of candles.

"I thought it was his eighth," his grandpa said, shrugging.

"… okay, more irrelevantness. HELP ME!" Daisuke shouted, throwing out his arms.

"We can't do that, sweetie!" said Daisuke's mom cheerily. "The only way you can change back to normal is if you steal art!"

"What? How does THAT work out?!" Daisuke yelled, looking between the two adults in confusion.

"… I don't really know," said his grandpa, looking only a half as confused as Daisuke.

"It's an ancient family curse! Oo-oo-ooh!" Daisuke's mom said, shining a flashlight under her eyes. "All the boys in the family get it when they turn fourteen. But all the other boys are extinct or too old or eaten by crocodiles, so you're the only one left. I, unfortunately, never get to do anything so fun as turn into Dark." She sniffled.

"Uh… Dark?" Daisuke asked. "Wait… why am I asking you guys? You're morons."

"You're talking to your mother, Mister Man!" Daisuke mom scolded. "Now, listen to your grandpa!"

"You steal art because it has ancient stuff inside it and then we destroy the evil spirits and then you turn back to normal," Daisuke's grandpa said. "Get me more tea."

"No." Daisuke's mom turned back to her son. "But you only transform into Dark when you think about Risa! Um, or so we've been told."

(I sort of changed it so that doesn't happen. Hey! Don't look at me like that! This isn't under the category 'romance', now is it?)

"Why?!"

"We have absolutely no idea!" his mom said, grinning. "But you better hurry! I sent out the notice for 11:00! Everyone's going to be waiting for you!"

"Wait… what?" Suddenly, Daisuke remembered. The big event that night was supposed to be him? "MOM! Why'd you tell everybody?"

"Oh, come on! I wanna see it on TV too ya know!" Daisuke's mom said. "That's why! Wiz is your wings. Don't ask."

"Do you mean to say I'm gonna fly?!"

"Like I said, I'm totally jealous." Daisuke's mom sobbed slightly. "Waah… You're so lucky! Oh and feed Wiz."

Daisuke sighed and took out Wiz's food, some weird brand called 'Bugs and Stuff'. He didn't want to know what the 'and Stuff' was, but Wiz sure seemed to like it. He was a little confused, but then again, there was really not much straight-forward about his life.

"…Daisuke?"

Silence.

"Come on, Daisuke. I know you're still there. You have to jump off the roof with Wiz or you'll never make it in time! I have camera people waiting!"

"Now I feel extra super confident, THANKS MOM!"

"No problem, my Daisuke-Dumpling!"

Suddenly, Daisuke's mom came and pushed him from behind into the sky. Daisuke screamed almost the whole way, but passed out because he ran out of air. He woke flying across the moon, looking super-cool for the cameras and millions of adoring fan girls that wanted nothing more but to get their paws on him before any of the other Dark wannabes did.

"Oh, Riku!" Risa sighed for the nine millionth time that night. "I'm going to marry Dark someday and we're going to fly off into the sunset and raise our purple-haired little offspring together and we'll live in a big house on a high hill far away from all the other conniving little witches who want to destroy our happy little family! I will be so happy! And you can come visit us, Riku, because I know you wouldn't dare steal him from me, would you?"

"Oh, heaven forbid," said Riku flatly, who was scarcely paying attention to the ramblings of her love struck twin.

Risa approached her sister slyly. "So, I see you're reading one of my girly girl magazines! Need tips about a boy? Got your eye on someone? ... Hey! Give me that marker! Honestly, can't I give you a magazine without you drawing a mustache on every hot guy in there?"

"I didn't think you'd care, you've got your heart set on Dark," Riku answered, grinning slightly. Suddenly, she had to close her ears to stop herself from hearing Risa's high-pitched squeal of delight and watched her sister race forward to press her nose against the TV screen.

"He's on! He's on! Oh my, isn't he hot, Riku? Don't answer that. Oh, he's going inside! Aw, that's all we get to see? No inside footage?" Risa pouted, walking over to her bed and slumping down on it. "That was only a few seconds… but they sure were magical!"

"I'm going to go bathe," Riku muttered, walking away.

"Okay… let's see… I'm looking for a statue of a head," Daisuke mumbled to himself, than took out the picture his mother had given him of the statue. It was the upper half of a guy with curly hair. "Great. That looks like almost every statue here…"

Suddenly, he heard shouts coming from the hall.

"ZOMG, what the heck am I gonna do?!" Daisuke raced into a broom closet and hid. "How come everyone seems to know about Dark except for me? Why does everyone know everything that goes on except me?! Oh no, here comes someone…"

A man opened the door. Daisuke shouted the first thing that came into his head.

"Do you mind? I'm naked."

"Oh, sorry- HEY WAIT A MINUTE!" the man yelled after him as Daisuke disappeared down a corridor.

Wonder where THAT came from… at least it worked, Daisuke thought to himself. Well, then again, who else would he be thinking to?

"Hey, Dark! Look over here!"

I know that voice…

Daisuke turned around. It was Takeshi.

"Smile for the camera, Dark! The world loves ya! Except the police... hmm..."

"I don't have time for this!" Daisuke shouted. "Where's the head? Have you seen it, Takeshi?"

"Oh my God! You know my name!" Takeshi fell over for the third time that day, but behind him was the very statue Daisuke was looking for. Daisuke grabbed it and started making a mad dash for the window, when someone grabbed him.

"Takeshi, let go-" Daisuke started, but it wasn't Takeshi.

It was (dun, dun, dun!) Satoshi.

"Hello, Dark. We meet again," he said with an evil grin.

Oh, the epicness! Can you hardly contain yourselves? Chapter four awaits!