Dawn's Day Off

It was a beautiful and bright morning this Friday.

Dawn had lifted himself off the bed as he felt the light from the sun inspire him to finally move his body around.

Actually, it had been doing so for the past 2 hours, for Dawn was the first one in the room to wake up that morning. He simply stayed in bed while everyone else left the room because he couldn't be bothered to interact with anyone so soon during the day.

Dawn slept on the bed right in front of the window and had a direct line of sight to the door in the room. He did so out of habit. 

Before he was coaxed (forced) to join the group, Dawn never used to go out much unless it was for something important like grocery shopping. So his main source of vitamin D would be from the sunlight that would hit him through his old bedroom window at home.

However, there was one more reason as to why Dawn was so reluctant to get out of bed today, and that was because today was a free day. In fact, for all he knew the whole weekend would be free because Minty had made an announcement right after their training yesterday that all missions and training sessions would be put on hold until further notice.

Dawn didn't know what brought about this change of schedule, but he didn't have any complaints about it either. He was simply going to sloth around.

He rolled his body out of bed and started his day. Brushing, showering, taking a dump, and doing all that he needed to freshen his body and mind and get himself comfortable enough to continue slothing away.

The way Dawn would describe himself on such a morning would be like a beautiful sunflower that blooms when the light hits its face in the morning. But the way that other people would describe Dawn right now would be a walking couch potato that hasn't been cleaned in months, carrying around a half-eaten bag of chips with it to go and continue to slouch somewhere else.

Dawn made his way into the living room, where he saw Cyrus setting up something behind the television. Dawn was modestly surprised at how he hadn't noticed the flatscreen TV before but then quickly got over it after remembering the type of place he was in.

He wanted to head towards the kitchen to grab himself a snack to lay down with and relax but looking inside the room from the outside, he could see Vito and Edith chatting it up in there.

Contaminating the environment with their presence.

'Of all the places to chat did they have to pick the kitchen? Knowing Edith, it makes sense why they would be there,' Dawn thought in his mind as he squinted his eyes and kissed his teeth at them.

Dawn began making his way up the stairs as quickly and silently as he could so as not to disturb his peace by mingling with them. 

He was about halfway there when Cyrus called him out and said, "Good morning Dawn, looks like you finally decided to get out of bed."

Edith and Vito turned their heads upon hearing his name and smiled accordingly.

"Heya!" Edith waved.

"Yo," Vito said as he gestured a peace sign.

Dawn stopped in his tracks but didn't dare look back at them, he could feel Cyrus's smug face from behind him and didn't want to bother giving him any attention.

He lifted his hand up like a monarch greeting his nation and replied back, "Hello, people," as he continued his way up the stairs.

Edith and Vito were left confused at his awkward greeting but decided that this was within the normal bar for Dawn, so they continued chatting away as they had before.

"Hey Dawn, I notice you are heading upstairs, do you have anything planned out to do up there?" Cyrus asked.

"Why does it matter?" Dawn responded.

"Oh well, nothing much," Cyrus shrugged. "Just figured I'd let you know that the aquarium is open again."

"It's what!!?" Dawn screamed at the top of his lungs.

This sudden burst of energy frightened both Vito and Edith as they subtly shook from surprise.

Immediately after, Dawn threw his legs over the staircase rails and jumped down back onto the living room floor as he ran for his life to get into the aquarium.

This whole sequence had everyone who watched it shocked. They had never seen Dawn so enthusiastic about anything so far, and his actions were so strange that it felt like something a cartoon character would do on a Saturday morning show.

'Perhaps I got him, too excited?' Cyrus thought regretfully.

Dawn had made his way past the door, and with each step he took in the aquarium he had passed by another tank in the room. With each tank he passed, his excitement to finally get to Timmy grew in him more and more.

He couldn't remember the last time he had ever felt such joy before. He ran through the dark-ish hallway with the brightest smile on his face.

He was moving so quickly that he almost ran right past Timmy's fish tank, and as he stopped himself from moving forward, he ended up spraining his ankle and collapsing on the floor face flat.

He was in great pain for a moment as the symbol on his shoulder went to work repairing the damages he had caused to himself.

As he fell down, he had landed with such a loud *thud* sound that it alerted Minty who was further back in the room sweeping the floor ahead.

Minty dropped her broom and went to see what had caused such a ruckus within the aquarium, and her heart almost sank in despair when she saw Dawn lying down and collapsed on the floor.

She had half a mind to shut down the aquarium for good and file an urgent complaint to Alex about it, but that was until she saw Dawn getting back up from the ground with some minor bruises that were healing already.

"Dawn!" she yelled concerned.

"Oh, Minty, you are here. Haha, this is a little embarrassing, I ran down here from the hallway just a little while ago and ended up tripping and failing. I should be fine though, I'm a representative after all," Dawn said as blood dropped down from his face.

Minty saw the smile on his face as he uttered those words, and now she was more than certain that there was something wrong with him. He would never simply smile that brightly for no reason.

Minty then spent the next 5 minutes examining him and watching his wounds regenerate as she had him explain to her again what had happened to him.

She wanted to believe his story, but seeing how this same thing sort of happened twice in a row to the same person just filled her mind with doubt. She wasn't one easily convinced by coincidence.

After she was done examining him, she was finally satisfied, she let him explain to her why he was so excited about coming back here in the first place, and he pointed at the fish tank beside them.

"The fish?" Minty asked confused.

"Not just any fish, Timmy! The greatest fish in the world," Dawn said with a loud cheer in his voice.

Minty almost swore that she could see sparkles in his eyes when he said that. Nonetheless, she had an idea of what he was talking about, the fish that were in this fish tank the last time he visited.

'Well, at least I made sure to get identical fish,' she sighed in relief as she watched him watch the fish in the tank.

Dawn's eyes followed their movements for a while, at first there was excitement in them as he placed both his hands right on top of the glass and almost had his face on it as well, but then that excitement was replaced by a short confusion.

And finally, that confusion was replaced by a void.

Dawn stepped back from the glass. His smile and excitement had faded, and he could only sorrowfully watch as the three little fishes swarmed around in the tank before him.

"What's the matter, Dawn?" Minty asked perplexed at the sudden change of atmosphere.

"These fish, they are not the same," Dawn answered.

"What do you mean?" Minty asked.

"These aren't my fish, they are different," Dawn replied.

Minty was slightly taken aback at how he came to this conclusion. Were the fish that came before unique by some specific characteristic? What was it that she wasn't seeing that he was?

It wasn't long that she contemplated this before Dawn pointed it out to her. 

"These fish," he said. "They are too big. They are all roughly a similar size to the last bunch, but Lenny was smaller than this. He was the smallest of the trio that used to be here, but he was also the most fierce and protective of them. Always acting like some bodyguard whenever somebody would approach the fish tank.

"Lilly was the shyest. She would always swim away to that corner whenever somebody would approach the tank or if she was ever upset with me. (Which she usually was.) It helped calm her nerves."

"And Timmy would always be the first one to come and greet me every time I placed my hand against the wall. It was a thing that he and I had, it was our way of showing each other, that we cared."

Dawn's voice broke down a little, his face darkened as he asked in a small cry of frustration, "They are dead aren't they? Lenny, Lilly, and Timmy. They all died, didn't they? Was it because of me!? Is it my fault since I broke the glass, that now all of my friends are gone!?"

"Did I cause this to happen to them?"

Tears were falling from his eyes as he turned towards Minty for an answer. He wanted to know what had happened to them, so he needed something, anything, any explanation would have sufficed, even a vague one. So long as it was enough to tell him what caused their deaths."

Minty felt her throat partially dry up as she looked at Dawn. There was a pain in her heart as she wished Alex or Sasha were here right now instead of her. Either of them would have done a better job comforting Dawn rather than herself.

She had never been good at handling these situations before because when she would think back to similar moments that happened to her in the past, all her younger self did was tell herself that she was strong enough to handle the suffering.

"Dawn," she said as she lowered herself to look him eye to eye and held his hand in both of hers. "I am so sorry, but it's not your fault. Believe me when I tell you that it's not your fault."

Dawn stood there in a state of self-loathing as he cried to himself saying, "That's not what I wanted to hear."

****

A few moments later, Dawn was making his way back through the living room, to try and get himself to the rooftop.

He felt pretty tired and just wanted some fresh air to energize his mental state.

As he passed the door to the aquarium, he saw Cyrus was waiting for him right outside with a cheery smile on his face.

Dawn was NOT having it right now and attempted to walk past him and continue on his way.

"So, how was the aquarium?" Cyrus asked.

"Mhm," Dawn responded.

"Good, good, anything more and that might have been enough excitement to give you a heart attack. Although I wonder if we could survive those seeing as how we are "technically" representatives." Cyrus mumbled as he pondered on that question.

"Ah wait," Cyrus spoke in a rush as he noticed Dawn walking right past him.

"What?" Dawn asked.

"Okay, so you remember that deal we made when you and I were on a mission with John, ("if that's even his real name," Cyrus muttered,) about me getting you that latest game that you wanted?"

"Yeah?" Dawn replied.

"Well, it's sold out," Cyrus said as he feigned disappointment.

"Ugh," Dawn said displeased as he tried to move past Cyrus again.

"But," Cyrus said as he stopped him again. "I did manage to compensate by getting you this CD of the new City Fighter 6 that just came out, as well a brand new console for you to try it out on with me and the others over by the living room. I already set up everything and even got you a new controller. So, are you down to play a game or two?"

Dawn looked at Cyrus bewildered, he didn't expect him to go this far just to make good on a promise that the two of them made ages ago. Dawn himself had completely forgotten about the deal in the first place, so that was why he never even brought it up again.

He wanted to say something but was so utterly stunned that his mouth kind of just hung open for a while as he stared at the disc in a feeling of disbelief and amusement.

"Well is that a yes? a no? a maybe?" Cyrus asked as he snapped Dawn out of his trance.

Dawn blinked his eyes multiple times as he came to, and then chuckled a little as he replied, "Sure."

He then took the disc out of Cyrus's hand and made his way towards the living, filled with excitement towards something new once more.

As he walked away, half skipping even, Cyrus remained where he was as he took out another disc that was well hidden away in his back pocket during their entire conversation.

"Yep, definitely sold out," he grinned as his glasses shone from the reflection of the light bouncing off the disc in his hands.