Disclaimer time! I do not own any copyrights and I adopted this story from the awesome NewSatan! Thanks to this person I've been allowed to finish this story for the fans and myself! First though we gotta get all these chapters up!
Chapter 3: Investigation
The rest of their day was spent in analyzing every bit of information Dan could muster up as well as asking their old alien comrades about the world Dan was dreaming about, but alas there was no luck as their Vestal friends had no intel while the Gundalians and Neathians just raised their eyebrows before proclaiming that they had never heard of such things or people before now. They soon grew weary of their research as it always landed them with nothing more to gain informatively.
"This is hopeless!" Dan groaned as he threw himself down on his parents' couch in the living room.
It was after they had returned back from questioning Ren and their other Gundalian allies. They had returned with nothing to show for it and the aggravation was easily manifesting from each of them.
"It's only been a day, Dan." Marucho said as he tried to sound reassuring as he plopped himself down on the floor, facing toward the brunette.
"We should have at least something!" Dan grumbled, "Just one tiny clue would be good enough for me."
"Patience Dan," Shun said calmly as he feigned his relaxed state, "Well find some answers eventually."
Shun sat down on the arm of the couch as Dan spoke again, "I hope so, at this point I almost want the voices to come back."
Marucho raised an eyebrow and tilted his head a little to the right as he spoke, "Didn't you say that you normally only heard four words?"
"Yeah," Dan replied as he turned over on the couch to lay on his side as he spoke, "maybe if I concentrate really hard then I might be able to hear words other than the ones I normally hear. Perhaps I'll even pick up on a conversation between that group of people like before."
"Or you could have another visionary dream." Drago suggested making Dan perk up a little.
"Yeah!" Dan piped up as a more cheery mood overtook him, "I got a bunch of information from the other dream so why not again, but it's still too bright out."
"And it's only six." Marucho added in as he looked at his watch, "The sun won't go down for at least another two hours."
"Knowing Dan, you can't sleep until the sun goes down." Shun stated.
"Yeah, but I gotta be tired too ya know." Dan said with a sheepish chuckle, "So what's the plan of action then? Sleeping pills?"
"Now you're being ridiculous." Drago jumped in, "Why not kill the time by watching some television."
"That's a good idea, but no dice," Dan replied, "I gotta be exhausted too."
"I know let's go to my place! We can go swimming at the indoor pool I have to kill the time and it's an activity that uses a lot of energy so it'll easily wear Dan out." Marucho proclaimed happily.
"I'm game." Shun said as he stood up before looking to Dan as the brunette was beaming.
"It's perfect, I'll be right back with my swim trunks!" Dan said leaping off the couch with a display of energy the Battle Brawlers hadn't seen in a long time.
Drago chuckled as he watched his partner scurry about with renewed energy. It was almost like Dan was his old self again, but a foreboding thought crossed Drago's mind, how long would it last?
Dan returned as quickly as he left and allowed Drago to settle on his shoulder before they went on their merry way, first to Shun's house to pick up his trunks and then Marucho's house right after. It wasn't too long before the two hours of swimming passed by as Dan and the other thoroughly enjoyed their time in the large pool that went clear to fifteen feet deep. Dan managed to convince Shun to have a contest with him to see who could stay on the bottom the longest. They kept ending up with draws so they all tried to race each other the perimeter of the pool. Dan beat Shun barely while poor Marucho was left in the dust or rather in the left over bubbles the two more athletic friends had left him in. They ended off with having a diving contest to see who could make the biggest splash. They all kept tying until Dan found all of Marucho's floaties and filled the pool with them making it harder for the other two to win after his sabotage. One point after Marucho had jumped back in, Dan had managed to get under a life sized shark floatie and snuck up behind Marucho scaring the poor blonde as he chased him all over the pool with it. Shun stopped him after a while for he nearly busted his sides from laughing so hard at the scene.
"It's been nearly three hours and you're getting slower with chasing poor Marucho all over the pool with that thing." Shun said as he gestured to the clock behind him and then pointed to Marucho as the blonde was doing his best to clamber up on a large sea turtle floatie that even Dan would have trouble getting up on.
Marucho was panting hard as he made it up on the kiddie pool sized shell.
"Good grief Dan, that was you the entire time? I thought that one of our motorized floatie toys had gone haywire!" Marucho exclaimed.
"Nope it was Dan the whole time!" Shun said with a smirk, "Shall we gather them up and save Kato from such a work load?"
"Sure! I'm up for it! I only got to play with the shark so far." Dan replied with a big grin.
"Put away not play." Shun said sternly making Dan pout a little.
"Fine. Sorry about that Marucho, I promise I'm not going to chase you around with the toys anymore." Dan called to the brunette.
"Good." Marucho replied before jumping off the sea turtle and resurfacing to grab onto it's fin and the fin of an Orca next to it.
It took them a few minutes to clear the pool, but in the end they all were exhausted enough that when they finally got switched to their pajamas that as soon as Dan's head hit the pillow he was already in a deep slumber. Marucho and Shun followed suit as did Drago.
Dan was soon dreaming that he had woken up to find himself on marbled flooring. He quickly sat up and looked about his surroundings finding himself alone in some sort of giant hallway. He noticed the windows quickly as they towered at the height of a giraffe from on his left and to his right were doors of the same height, maybe a little smaller, but all were shut.
"What's going on here?" Dan wondered as he got to his feet.
His eyes focused outside the window as he noticed the time of day it was outside of the building, dusk. Besides that he saw there were mountains in the far off distance and below in the valley was a large town and the building he was in seemed to be up on a tall hill which gave him a good overlook of the scenery displayed below.
Soon after discovering the layout of the land beyond what he guessed was the castle, he heard voices coming from his left. Panicking, he quickly hid himself behind one of the large curtains hanging on the windows.
"There's nothing to do around here." A male voice whined.
"Oh, quit complaining Samillis." Said a different voice which indicated the owner of the first voice, but left no indication of it's own identity, Dan could only guess it was another male.
"I can't help it, there's seriously nothing to do!" Samillis argued his tone still whining earning a sigh from his companion.
"You're repeating yourself now." The unidentified voice remarked dryly, "Why don't you go out flying or see if the others are playing one of the games, maybe train a little bit? Also Fameriosa is right there so why not go hang around town? You might even meet someone special down there, or make a new friend of some sort."
Dan became a little excited as he was gaining more knowledge about the world he was in and he prayed for more as he listened to the conversation from behind the curtain.
"Why don't you come with me then Druvious? You're a better wingman for stuff." Samillis insisted and also gave Dan the identity of the other speaker.
Druvious sighed before he answered, "I can't, I've got work to do."
Dan suspected that a groan came Samillis before Druvious spoke again.
"Perhaps Ramere would be more interested in being your wingman?" Druvious suggested plainly.
"Nah," Samillis replied boredly, "Ever since the news about the new Serlin that's supposed to be from Earth, he's been lost in his own world."
Dan let a gasp escape him as he realized that these people knew about Earth. He silently came out from behind the curtain finding the pair standing in the middle of the hallway right in front of the curtain Dan had been hiding in. They didn't seem to notice him and Dan remembered it was only a visionary dream so of course they couldn't see him. He irked at his own stupidity for a moment before continuing to listen.
"I see." Druvious stated with a small smile, "I too have noted that Ramere has become rather…obsessive about our new comer. I also guess it wouldn't hurt to tag along with you, but only for a couple of hours after all the work won't do itself while I'm gone."
Samillis grinned from ear to ear as he had finally convinced Druvious to come along with him. Also Dan had finally noted that their clothing was different from the last time he had seen them. Both were wearing black combat boots, gloves, cloaks, tight suits that had dozens of pockets, and a utility belt reminiscent of a certain super hero. The differences though was that Samillis gloves were fingerless and Druvious was black with dark brown trimming while the other's was completely black. Dan spotted a strange insignia on their cloaks, but didn't have time to make it out as the two winged boys began to walk down the hallway for five minutes in silence before the hall lead out to a balcony. They took off their cloaks and hung them on a rack provided in the hallway. As they neared a railing both gave their wings a few flaps as if to stretch them. Dan stayed back as he watched in awe of the spectacle.
"Ready?" Druvious asked as he broke the silence.
"Yup!" Samillis chimed as they walked to the railing and jumped up to it.
"Let's go then!" Druvious ushered before they both jumped at the same time.
Dan was in shock for a moment as he realized they had just jumped away from the railing. Fearful for their lives he ran to the railing to peer down and watch them free falling. Dan realized that the building was at least ten stories high and past that was a cliff face hanging above the ocean. He began to panic as they were close to smacking hard into the water, but at perhaps seventeen feet they allowed their wings to shoot out from their bodies and carry them higher into the air. Dan let out a sigh of relief and slumped against the railing.
"That was a close one." He murmured before closing his eyes for a moment only to reopen them a find he was lying face down in a bed.
Quickly he remembered where he actually was now. He contorted a frown at this predicament as he was only dreaming just moments ago, but it had all felt so real.
"I wanna go back." He murmured, but wish with all his heart.
With so much of the wish filling his mind, he forgot that sometimes you have to be careful of what you wish for.