Shard stumbled out of the chamber, breathing heavily and holding himself up with a hand against the doorframe. "Why...do I...go along...with this?! I swear if it wasn't for the money I would have quit years ago." He caught his breath and walked down a long plain white hallway, all the while contemplating whether or not to actually continue. 'Beach house on the waterfront, beach house on the waterfront, beach house on the waterfront.' He kept repeating in his head to keep himself going, remembering the little place he had been saving up for for years.

As he reached the door at the end of the hallway it opened to reveal...a normal room in the building. Ditzy, Rayleigh and Plas walked out of a door. Ditzy had an unsure look in her eye and Rayleigh was being quiet.

"Hey guys, why so gl-" He couldn't finish as Ditzy brough him into a hug. He looked confused until Symbol walked out of the door. "You told them didn't you?"

Symbol nodded. "You would have put it off, figured it would be better if they found out sooner rather than later."

Shard blinked and looked down to Ditzy who had her face buried into his chest holding him close. He slowly wrapped his arms around her and kissed the top of her head before allowing her the comfort of his embrace.

Now you're all probably wondering what Ditzy and Rayleigh learned from Symbol, well I'll be happy to inform you about that now.

A few moments ago

Symbol began to speak. "You see, Shards family bloodline goes way back to a few centuries ago. In the year 1678 the Storm family was created in Japan, where two rivalling families, the Burizādo family and the Hōseki family, were caught in a huge storm. The two families had seeked refuge in a nearby temple but the rest of their villages populace was wiped out. Both families knew that in order to rebuild their village, they would need to work together and put aside their differences to honour their fallen. Over the course of the villages repair, a young man named Burēdo Burizādo met a young woman by the name of Rapisu Hōseki, the two of them fell in love and soon were to be married. While the two families had put aside their differences for the sake of their fallen, that did not mean that their rivalry ended. Both families were outraged at the news, declaring that of the engagement was not broken off the families would go to war."

"What did Burēdo and Rapisu do?" Ditzy asked.

"Rapisu was about to give into her families demands when Burēdo yelled in defiance to both families, right then and there he disowned his own family and challenged his fiancés father to a duel to earn her hand in marriage. When the father did not accept the challenge out of spite Rapisu took out a dagger and stabbed him in the back. The two were banished, but that was their plan so that they could be together, after having two children they took up the name Arashi, or Storm in Japanese. However, they didn't plan on their families calling upon ancient spirits to punish them." Symbol took in a breath and began to speak a quote of the ritual. "For crimes unheard but seen, true fear is what we deem. For every three sons there shall be flames, for they must know who to blame."

Ditzy just looked confused. "What does that mean?"

"Every three generations of the Storm family a boy with hair and eyes the colour of fire will be born and cursed with hidden anger and a literal burning rage. If one of them gets too angry, they start to burn, not I'm a harmful way but they burn none the less. At first this was to cause the children unending pain and making them want to blame their ancestors for having the curse placed on them, there are those that are born with a great deal of respect for their ancestors and harness the curses power to suit themselves in combat, however that does not mean they choose when to burn, it just means that it doesn't cause them pain. Shard is one of these sons, he cares about his ancestors, when he learns of another memorial or grave of one of his passed family me,hers he goes straight to it to pay his respects. So in turn his ancestors care about him and guide him along the right path in life, mentoring him in a way but not showing themselves or talking to him, they don't show their existence but when you've trained your senses like Shard has...you can sense when a ghostly presence is watching you."

"Well then that's good right? Like, Shard has some kind of superpower?" Ditzy asked happily.

Symbol shook his head. "It's a curse for a reason, it still has its downsides. For example, whenever he burns it takes a toll on his body, a serious toll, it's why he tries to suppress it. Also, if he stays burning for too long he'll start losing memories that are hard to regain, and lastly...the more he uses it...the darker he becomes." He said darkly.

Ditzy let all of this sink in. She looked to the screen where Shard was fighting the second giant robot, noticing how he was panting and sweating, his hair flickering but stopping as he strained himself. She put a hand to her chest and sat down, processing what she had just heard.

As Shard held Ditzy he looked to Plas. "I think that's enough for today Plas, I'll do the rest of the chambers tomorrow, after that I'm not coming in for awhile."

"It's understandable my friend, you go rest up and I'll inform Cybe that his plans must be postponed." With that Plas Proto exited the room.

"Come on Ditzy, let's go. I saw a cafe across the street, let's go get you a muffin." He said with a small smile.

She looked up at him and nodded, giving her own little smile.

Shard kissed her forehead and took her hand in his, and began walking towards an elevator with Rayleigh trailing behind them.

As the three sat in the small cafe across from the huge white tower Shard watched with a smile as Ditzy nibbled on her chocolate chip muffin, savouring ever crumb. He just couldn't get over how adorable she looked while doing it, he just continued smiling while taking the occasional sip of his mocha. Rayleigh sat beside Shard with his arms tucked under him, he was trying not to look back at the kids staring at him and instead focused on a small fruit fly that was walking about on the table, his eyes moving slowly as they followed it.

"Hey Ditzy?" Shard said as he set down his half finished chocolate coffee.

"Hmm?" Ditzy hummed while nibbling her muffin.

"I was thinking, after all that's happened today I figured we could both use a little downtime or something fun to cheer us up."

"Isn't this it?" She asked with an adorably confused expression. Shard chuckled at her and wiped some crumbs from her mouth before kissing her, causing her to blush adorably.

"Well, I was thinking about what we could do for our first real date and...how does dancing sound to you?"

Author's Notes:

There it is, Shards curse explained in the simplest way I could.

Hey, if you like this story and would like to see more like it you can head over to my latest PoME fic Romantic Redux, would appreciate your support on it