1 The Dream

"Kima! Kima!" I hear my name being echoed from far away. I can't move. The voice gets closer… "Hey! Kima please, wake up!"

What's...going on? I slowly regain consciousness and open my eyes, seeing a girl holding me in her arms with tears streaming her cheeks. Her face, I can't make out what she looks like. It's all blurry but she seems to be--

"Oh, Kima! I'm so glad you're okay…"

She sobs as her tears drip on my shocked and groggy face. She pulls me close and my head lays over her shoulder. I can smell her sweet scent, and it gives me some sense of relief. I feel an enormous amount of heat around us, it was frightening--walls of flame as tall as a street light flicker and snap. I look around and see bloody bodies on the ground, lifeless. She lays me down gently. I feel a sharp pain in my gut--I touch it. What's this? It's warm… I slowly lift my hand up and see blood. I start to lose all my strength and my hand drops.

"Am I… going to die? It hurts..." I strain to speak.

"Oh no no no no..." She says in a panic.

A horrific roar, rippling the air around me, breaks into the wall of fire. It's red and black stripes on its chest give me chills. It's bloody red eyes, looking down at us. It appears to be a demon fused with a dragon, its head is that of a dragon, and horns of a demon. It's huge, this almost makes me want to pass out. Where am I? What's happening?! I want to go home! Are the only thoughts in my head. The mysterious girl who said my name hugs me tightly--talks with a very soft, sobbing voice.

"I'm sorry for bringing you here…this is all my fault." She stood up and turned around. "I'll handle this." She says with a tone full of malice. What is she going to do against... that? I ask myself. Suddenly, the pressure in the air changes; the girl was engulfed and surrounded by a sky blue light with a hint of white sparks. The wind blew hard in my direction. She slowly walks up to the beast. In an instant, images flash with the mysterious girl fighting and getting knocked to the ground right before my eyes. She would not give up, is all that I could grasp from her battle. I kept passing out and waking up--every deafening exchange was an awakening. Before I knew it, I passed out completely.

Bzzzzz. I hear my phone's alarm as the sun shines through the window hitting my face, causing my eyes to open instantaneously. I lay in bed, looking at the ceiling drenched in sweat. My heart is pounding. I turn off the alarm and place my forearm on my forehead and sigh.

"What a dream… and what in the world was going on? That monster too…"

The memory of its image hits me again like a rock, and my heart jumps like it's happening all over again. I turn around in bed thinking. Who was that girl? How did she know my name?

I scratch my head trying to remember how she looked, but nothing comes to mind. I slowly begin to fall asleep again before my door slams open. Here we go again. I think to myself as my eyebrow twitched in annoyance.

"WAKE UP! WE STILL HAVE SCHOOL YOU KNOW!"

An angry girl in a school uniform comes in with her bag hung over her shoulder—her long brown hair shines in the bit of sunlight sneaking through the blinds. Her coffee brown eyes are locked onto mine as she approached me.

"Kima…" She says with a threatening tone. She drops her bag, grabs my favorite manga in one hand, and in the other with scissors.

"Don't make me cut this into shreds." She carries a fake smile to cover up the killing intent she has towards my book.

"Wait! Okay, okay, just stop! I'm up! Why do you always have to threaten me?" I said as I struggle to sit up on the side of my bed. She places my manga down then hides her weapon. "Because if I don't, you won't ever listen to me, duh." She smiles normally as if nothing happened. I sigh and look at her.

This is my childhood friend, Misaki Shirazawa. She's been with me since birth. Like literally since birth; we were both born on September 7th, 1998 at exactly 4 am. Her mother and my mother are best friends, they had given birth on the same day and the same hour. It's crazy, I know. She's very direct, honest, and loves martial arts. She could kick my ass if she wanted to. Despite her being shorter than me, she still outwits me in combat.

"Kima can you stop staring at me…" she says slightly blushing.

"Oh sorry, I didn't notice, I think I'm still half asleep. Now get out of my room, I have to change" I say.

"Why can't I stay here? You don't have to be so weird about it. You should know out of all people--how close we are. We're practically siblings." She invades my closet and throws my uniform onto the bed. "Since you're an insecure brat, I'll leave, but get ready fast because breakfast is ready and when you're done, we need to start heading out." I nod and she leaves the room. I get up and continue to do my morning routine. After breakfast, we head out and my mother walks us out.

"We're leaving!" Misaki says as she pushes me out. "Take care!" My mom smiles brightly and waves.

On our way there, I begin to think about that dream again. I just couldn't shake it off. Soon enough, we start getting near the school gates and someone pats my back hard.

"Ow!" I shout uncontrollably, as I turn to my right to see Tetsuya, my classmate, and my best friend.

"Hey Kima, Hey Misaki, good morning!" He says smiling warmly, "Morning Tetsu" Misaki and I say in unison.

Tetsuya chuckles and walks alongside us.

As I said, this is my best friend, Tetsuya Kyuya. He comes from a very prestigious and rich family. He decided to come to a public school with us because he wanted a kind of change in his life. He told us that he was fed up with all the rich kid expectations at his old school, so he transferred to our middle school. From there he came right to high school with us. Misaki and I met him when we were getting beat up by bullies. She started it by the way. He helped us fend off the bullies. Despite all of us getting beat up, it was fun, and we just laughed it all off in the end.

~~~Flashback~~~~

"My name is Tetsuya Kyuya, you could just call me Tetsu. Those guys were sure hard to beat, huh?" He said.

~~~Snapped out of it~~~~

He smiled so hard, like such an idiot that day—it made me really happy. Since then, he's become a part of our life. He's very upbeat and outgoing, he's the kind of guy who loves to lighten up the mood when things get serious. He does have the tendency of not thinking before he speaks.

"I can tell that Kima over here couldn't get out of bed this morning, huh Misaki?" He nudges and winks at me. I swat him away, Misaki then says, "Yeah, and when I went to his room, he was just laying there! Not even realizing that we have school. I waited downstairs for about 10 minutes because he didn't want me waking him up every morning--so he used his phone alarm."

I shove myself into the conversation, "I did wake up to the alarm! I just had a weird dream last night. You know those mornings where you just lay in bed trying to remember it?"

"Was it a wet dream?" Tetsu inappropriately comments.

"No! Just forget about it." I shake my head and laugh it off. Misaki just rolls her eyes.

~In school~

We make it to class, and I take a seat. Misaki sat behind me and Tetsu in front. I start to drift back into thought about the dream. "I'm sorry for bringing you here…" echoes in my head. The teacher calls my name during my daze.

"Sayori Kima!" He then repeats it with a stronger voice, then Misaki pokes me, which snaps me out of it. "Oh, Here!" I shout back.

Classmates all around start to laugh and the teacher continues to take roll. I start to feel Misaki's gaze hitting my back. I don't think I could tell her, she'll just take it as a joke and tell me that I'm over exaggerating. After a few classes have passed, I reach the period before lunch and I still have the dream lingering around in my head. Tetsu in front of me passes a worksheet back.

"Here bro." I wonder if I could tell Tetsu... I think to myself. Then, as I turn around handing back the papers, Misaki glares at me,

"What's wrong with you?" She whispers.

"Don't worry about it..." I retort. I turn back around and start my assignment.

"Well I am worried, so spill it." She whispered a bit louder.

"No!" I whispered louder than her.

"Say it!" She whispered too loud. The teacher looked at us and said, "Misaki and Kima, you guys get ten points off your assignment for disrupting the class. Let that be a warning." We both stay quiet, but I know that this isn't over.

The bell ring to proceed to the next class. "Have a good day everyone. Don't forget about tonight's homework." The teacher says before dismissing us. I finish gathering my belongings, then I go outside the classroom and guess who's waiting for me there?

"Hey, sorry about getting us in trouble. But I need to know why you're acting weird." Misaki says as she leans on the locker. Tetsu comes out last, "What's wrong with Kima?"

"Guys, it's really nothing. Just relax, I guess you could say I am overreacting because of the dream." I say out of panic. Misaki's facial expression becomes oddly serious and she goes into deep thought. "Uhh we should get going to our next class, there's nobody in the hallway," Tetsu mentions.

Misaki follows us and I sigh in relief that the conversation is over. The day goes by and lunch comes around.

"Hey Tetsu, let's g-" Misaki pulls me away from Tetsu mid-sentence and takes me to the hallway.

"Ow stop!" I say, but it hurts as I continue to struggle, plus I don't want my shirt to rip. As I'm being dragged, I'm holding my arms out for Tetsu's help. "Help...me..." I choke trying to talk since Misaki pulled my collar. He shrugs nervously, knowing that if he would interfere, Misaki would try to fight him. The hallway wasn't too bad of a place for me to explain that deranged dream, I just don't want anyone thinking that I'm the deranged one here.

"Kima, I know you don't like telling me about your problems--since I mess with you a lot." I dart my eyes away and sigh, "If you know why I won't tell you, why do you keep prying? I know you don't care and you just want to laugh at me." She hits my head.

"I'm serious! I-I do care about you..." An awkward silence breezed by. I attempt to break the silence, but Tetsu comes to the rescue.

"What's taking you guys so long?" Misaki glares at him and he backs up scared. As I build up the courage I say, "Misaki, I had a dream last night. It was weird, and it was so clear with so much feeling. It was just on my mind all day" I get to the point. I knew Tetsuya is near the door listening since I can see him from the corner of my eye. Misaki sighs and asks, "So? What was it about?" She walks towards the window across the hallway and looks out of it.

"We are gonna miss lunch, Misaki" I mention. Misaki turns around, "Don't worry I'll buy you food after school." She smiles, and a feeling of relief runs through my body. I approach her and start to talk about it. Throughout the story, she is surprisingly silent. Towards the end of the dream, she looks away. I finish and there is a slight pause. The bell rings to signal that lunch is over, and I keep looking at Misaki for a response.

"Kima, I'll tell you what I think about your dream later." She says that quietly. "I know this may sound ridiculous, but I think we might have had the same dream last night. Mine was just in a different area--if that makes sense." She walks past me as I was frozen in shock. I turn around quickly, "Really?" She stops, "Yeah, let's talk later." She enters the next class and I didn't notice Tetsu had left too.

Same dream? I start to ponder on how that could be possible while I head to my next class.