A fire's shadow: Fading

He's gone?

The sun shone through the red ninja's window and onto his sleeping face, and a groan escaped the hero as the light woke him up. He opened his eyes only to be blinded by the sunlight that hit his face. As the memories of last night repeated in his head, he couldn't help but sigh as he shifted into a sitting position, stretching his arms before standing up.

After getting dressed he walked out of his room and soon entered the dining room where almost his whole family was eating breakfast, emphasize on 'almost'. "Where's Shadow?" The others turned their heads to him with confused expressions.

"He wasn't with you?" The black ninja asked, his voice mirroring the confused expression on his face.

"No, why would he be with me?"

"Because he didn't answer the door like usual when we knocked so we thought he was with you. Did he come home last night?"

"Yeah, he did. I talked to him and everything." The more the red ninja thought about it, the more the realization hit him, "Oh no. Don't tell me." He broke into a run down the hall towards his brother's room. As he reached the door he could hear the others' footsteps running up from behind him. Knocking hard on the door he shouted, hoping his brother had just slept in, "Shadow! Are you there!?" The more time that went by without a response, the more Kai feared the truth about his brother's whereabouts.

He started trying to break down the door and as soon as it was open, he rushed in only to be met with an empty room. "That idiot!" He growled loudly, making the others even more concerned.

"Kai, what's going on?" The ninja of water asked as her brother was frantically looking around the room for any sign of where their missing teammate could be.

"I think Shadow might have left." The brunette growled.

"What do you mean?"

Kai started explaining briefly about what happened the night before, and the more he said, the more the ninjas understood why he had a suspicion of Shadow leaving. "He couldn't just have left, he must have left a note or something!?" Nya was starting to cry, she couldn't believe one of her brothers might have left his family by his own will.

"No, he didn't. And even if he did, what would that do. I don't think even he knows where he's going, so it wouldn't do us any good." Kai sighed.

"We have to look for him though."

"But if Shadow left, by his own, doesn't that mean he doesn't want us to find him." The nindroid asked, confusion dripping from his robotic voice.

"Yeah, but he left thinking that he's to blame for everything that has gone bad lately. We need to find him and get it into that thick skull of his that that isn't true." The fire master sighed while scanning over what stuff was missing from his brother's room trying to pinpoint about where he might have gone.

"I'm going to call the elemental masters and ask them to keep an eye out." Nya rushed out towards the control bridge.

Kai sat down on Shadow's bed, his face buried in his hands. The green ninja turned to the other three ninjas, "Could you guys go and start the search, Kai and I will join you guys soon."

Nodding, the other ninjas left the room, leaving the red and green ninjas alone. Walking up to the brunette, Lloyd sat down next to him. "We will find him, Kai."

Removing his hands from his face, the red ninja sighed, "I know he can take care of himself, but what he said last night keeps repeating in my head. He told me to give up on him because he can't be saved, but I just can't do that. And I don't want him to feel like he's to blame for this."

"I don't want him to either. But I can see why he thinks that he's to blame, even though it's not true."

"So can I. I just wish he could understand how much we care and that he is not to blame, but the only way to make him see that is to find him."

Lloyd stood up, "Then what are we waiting for! Let's go find our brother."

Kai smiled and stood up, "Yeah let's do it."

...

The wind smashed at Kai's face as he soared through the sky on his dragon. "Shadow didn't use a dragon, seeing as he can't control it quite yet and he doesn't want to be seen. Which means he is going by foot. And judging by the fact that he wants to stay hidden and that he has more energy during the night, I'd say he's walking at night and sleeping or hiding during the day."

"Well, that's useful information, Kai," Zane's robotic voice sounded over the communicator.

"Yeah, and seeing as he came home at about 1 Am last night I'd say he hasn't gotten too far yet." The green ninja concluded.

"Yeah, hopefully, we can find him before he gets too far." The water ninja sighed.

...

The ninjas searched the whole day and the whole night, but they couldn't find any trace of where Shadow was. As the sun started rising, they all went back to the bounty to regroup. Sitting in the dining room, they all tried to come up with a plan. But no one had any idea on where to start or what to do. They had no clue to go at and no trace to follow. It was like looking for a needle in a hay bale. Kai was quiet almost the whole meeting, he couldn't figure out what to say. He was giving up.

...

Amy's POV

Ever since I woke up in the hospital that day, something has felt wrong. My aunt told me that I lost about two months of my memories in an accident, and she's lying about what kind of accident that was. I may not remember what happened, but I know it wasn't a car crash, that's for sure.

I have regained most of the memories I lost, but there are about two weeks of my memories still lost. Also, apparently I was saved from a fire two months ago, but I can't remember who it was that saved me, or at least not clearly. I remember a pair of crimson eyes, but that's it. I've asked my aunt to tell me more, but she always changes the subject and avoids the question which means she knows something but just won't tell me. Maybe it has something to do with the conversation I heard her have with someone in the hospital. I didn't hear much of it, but I heard her promise this stranger something, but I don't know what.

Sighing, I turned over and started staring at the wall instead of the ceiling. My eyes wandered around my room until they landed on my phone. I haven't touched it since I got out of the hospital, it just hadn't crossed my mind before. I reached out my hand and grabbed the mobile. As I turned on the screen and was met with a photo. Frowning, I unlocked the phone and went to my gallery. I had a lot of pictures. But all of the latest ones were of either me and a boy I don't recognize or of just the boy. The latest one of them was from two weeks before the accident.

I opened the oldest one and started looking through them. The boy had ash colored hair and in most of the pictures, he was wearing black colored clothes, but he wore a red tank top in a few pictures. But there was one thing that caught my eye about him. His eyes were the same vibrant crimson color that the person that saved me from the fire had. Had he been the one that saved me?

Judging by the pictures, he and I were very close. But then why didn't he visit me in the hospital? As I kept scanning through my phone I stumbled across an audio file. It had the name "Shadow singing." Shadow? Who's that? The name sounded familiar, but I couldn't quite remember why. I plugged in my headphones and put them on, before playing the audio.