Once it was determined that Mo actually wasn't the dragon, everyone headed to their classes like any other day. When the final bell rang, Sora was relieved. It was Friday, after all, and that meant two days of complete freedom.

Hopefully, Drake wasn't coming up with a long list of things for her to do. That would totally ruin her good mood.

As if reading her thoughts, Drake appeared in front of her desk with a serious expression on his face. "I need you to write down all the names of the people that were there the night of the fire."

Sora shushed him as she dragged on his sleeve pulling him closer to her. "You can't talk about the fire here! I don't want anyone to figure out that I know who was there that night. It is too dangerous!" She was whispering although she felt like yelling at him. Fear washed over her when she looked behind Drake and saw Alicia standing at the door, watching them.

"Is everything okay?" Alicia said and took a tiny step closer to them.

"Yeah, everything's perfect." Sora jumped from her seat, picked up her bag and started walking towards the exit. She still had her fingers clamped firmly on Drake's shirt, so he had no choice but to follow her.

Once they were a safe distance away from the prying eyes of their classmates, Sora halted and turned to face Drake. He was looking down at his arm confused. She followed his gaze and realized with surprise she was still holding onto him. Immediately she released him. "Sorry," she mumbled at her feet, hiding her flushed cheeks.

Even if she couldn't see Drake's face, she sensed his shrug. "I need the list," he said all business again. Sora was relieved that he ignored her behavior, she didn't want any awkwardness between them, not any more than already existed. She wanted to keep focused on the task at hand. She refused to think about the fact that Drake could turn into a dragon at any moment.

"I will need some time to come up with the list," she said, already listing people in her mind. "I don't want to forget anyone. I can have it ready by tomorrow morning. Keep in mind that a list of names isn't going to be a big help to you since you can't pair faces to names. You are still the new guy."

"I like lists," he said like it was a fact that she should already know.

Sora couldn't tell if he was serious or joking by his tone, so she finally dared to sneak a peek at his face. There was a brief moment when she thought she wouldn't be able to tell the difference, but then, somehow, she knew he was serious. "You're such a weirdo," she said and immediately covered her mouth with one hand, her eyes growing wide. She couldn't believe she had just said that, to someone who could transform into a dragon, no less.

Instead of being insulted, Drake smiled widely. It was the first time she had seen such an honest smile on his face, and truthfully, she liked it. "Fortunately, so are you," he said still smiling.

Sora couldn't help laughing. Maybe we're not all business after all, she thought as they turned to head home.

***

After spending some time with her grandparents, Sora was happy to spend the rest of her afternoon blissfully doing nothing. Earlier, she managed to make her first perfect origami crane with her grandfather. When she handed it to her grandfather to add it to his collection, he refused. He told her that in order for his wish to come true, he had to be the one to make all one thousand cranes. He suggested she start her own origami goal. She smiled as she put the purple origami in a drawer with the number one written on its wings.

Once her grandparents left, Sora was glad to be able to be alone with her thoughts. After all, she had a list to make. She grabbed a blank piece of paper and an orange pen and made her way to the kitchen. She loved the huge dark table and always enjoyed doing her homework there. Compiling a list of suspects somehow felt like homework to her. But before she could even write down the first name, there was a knock on the back door.

She threw open the door to find Drake standing there. No big surprise. "Come in," she murmured while rolling her eyes.

He gave Kiba one last pat between his eyes and followed her inside. "What's wrong?" he asked with a crooked smile on his face, not missing the dramatic eye roll.

They settled side by side at the table, Sora took a deep breath before speaking. "I was just writing your list," she explained. "Sometimes I think you are stalking me."

Drake passed a hand through his messy hair and shot her a somewhat serious look. "Maybe I am."

"Great," she said sarcastically. "Want to watch me while I sleep as well? I can always leave the back door unlocked."

He gave a single snort at the comment, and then his eyes fell to the paper in front of her. "I see you haven't started yet."

"I was just about to," Sora said. She snatched up the pen and hurriedly started scribbling down names.

Drake smirked when he saw the color of the letters. "This is orange," he exclaimed, his eyebrows shooting up.

"So what? You like your lists, and I like my colorful pens."

After a few more minutes of silly banter on lists and pens, Sora completed the list. She had managed to remember every single person that was at the school that night. Proudly, she shoved the list over to Drake.

When he took the paper their fingertips brushed, and she felt an all too familiar jolt of static electricity. "Is this ever going to stop?" she asked, snatching her hand away as quickly as she could.

He shrugged and started perusing at the list of orange names. "I am not sure. When a dragon joins the pack, it undergoes a ritual that involves touching the Sensers while in their dragon form. Usually, the electricity jolts stop afterward," he explained, his eyes moving fast from left to right, reading the names one by one.

Sora's mind filled with some very disturbing images of people and dragons gathered around a fire, performing 'rituals'. "So will I join the pack?" she finally asked.

Drake's eyes turned fast to meet hers, his expression dark. He was surprised and concerned, which only made Sora feel even more uptight over the whole dragon thing. "No." His answer was so absolute that Sora didn't press him, despite her growing curiosity. She got the feeling that he didn't really like what he was and what he had to do for the pack.

"Okay. So, these are all the people that were there that night," she said changing the conversation. "I can point them out to you when we get back to school on Monday."

He took another hard look at the list. "Or," he started and Sora immediately knew she wasn't going to like his proposal. "We can pay some home visits."

"We are not going to do that." She shot up from her seat and stormed into the kitchen for a glass of water. She let the cool liquid wash away the knot that was forming in her stomach. "And even if we did, what would be the excuse? Good morning, would you mind if I touched you? That's borderline pervy."

Drake smiled his bright, honest smile once more. "I wasn't going to suggest that." Sora glared at him expectantly. "Weren't all these students on your football team?" he finally asked.

"Well, yeah." She opened the refrigerator door so that she wouldn't have to look at his smile anymore. "We don't really hang anymore since the teams were disbanded." She got a soda and asked if he wanted one too, but he refused.

"Really? Is this why you are always with that tiny girl?"

Sora suddenly felt the need to defend her friend. "That tiny girl happens to be my best friend, and her name is Katie."

His hands shot up, palms out in a placating gesture. "Okay, calm down. I didn't mean anything by it."

Sora took a deep breath to cool down and flopped back into her chair.

"What about the newspaper guy?" Drake asked casually, his eyes pinned on the paper in his hands.

"Mo?" Sora almost choked before mouthing his name.

"He appears to know you guys well enough." Drake still had his eyes glued on the paper.

"I've known him as long as I can remember, even before I met Katie. His parents were friends with mine, and we spent a lot of time together as kids, more like grew up together since he is only a year older." She stopped and took another sip from her drink. "Even after my parents died, he kept visiting my house, and my grandparents became friends with his parents, so we maintained out friendship."

"You don't seem to be that close," Drake commented, and Sora realized that he had shifted his eyes from the paper to her.

She shook her head as if to clear her mind and kept on talking. "When Mo started at the Darkwood Academy, things changed. He turned into this boy genius who didn't have time for fun and games anymore." As she said the words, Sora felt an old feeling of bitterness resurfacing. She didn't remember her life with her parents, so losing them didn't really leave a lasting impression, but losing Mo was a whole other matter. She was devastated when he suddenly stopped coming to her house and completely cut her off.

"He doesn't really look like a genius," Drake snorted. "He looks more like a pain in the ass."

Sora scowled. "Give him time, he might surprise you." She said and smiled faintly. Even though she still felt mad at Mo for giving up on her, she had witnessed his brilliance on more than one occasion, and she couldn't help but to admire him.

***

An hour later, Sora bid Drake goodnight after making it perfectly clear that there would be no more talk of home visits to their classmates. It was a hard sell, but he finally agreed to wait until Monday when they could attempt to flush out the dragon.

Sora was still trying to wrap her head around the fact that one of her teammates was an actual dragon. No matter, she had to deal with it. She had seen a dragon with her own eyes after all, so there was no use denying it.

When her grandparents returned home, Sora was exhausted so she just kissed them goodnight and headed to bed. She burrowed under the covers and closed her eyes, surprised to find her mind blank. Immediately, she drifted off into a blissful sleep.

She was in the middle of a pleasant and peaceful dream for a change, when her phone started ringing. She threw her hand toward the noise without even opening her eyes.

"Hello," she said, her voice croaking with grogginess.

"It's Mo. Were you asleep?" He was whispering, but she knew it was really him, she could recognize his voice anywhere.

Suddenly, she was fully awake. She sat up on her bed and rubbed her eyes to shake out the sleepiness. "No," she said her voice almost back to normal. She didn't know why she lied, but for some reason she didn't want to admit that she had managed to fall asleep so easily with everything that was going on, especially if Mo was still awake.

"Good, 'cause I didn't want to wake you." She could barely hear him because he was whispering so softly.

She took a quick look around her. It was pitch dark in the room, aside from the glaring clock numbers on her night stand. To her surprise it was three a.m.

"No, you didn't wake me. What's going on?" Her mind raced with worry at receiving a call at this hour, but at the same time she could hear the excitement in his voice. He hadn't called her in years; as a matter of fact, she didn't even know he had her number.

"Well, funny you should ask. I am kind of... in trouble," he said almost casually, but Sora could feel the tension in his voice. She shot up from her bed, relieved to see that once again she had fallen asleep with her clothes still on.

"Where are you?" she demanded, already pulling on her shoes.

There was a small pause that made Sora's heart skip a few beats. Mo took a deep breath slowly before answering. "Next door."