Thank you for opening the first chapter of My 3rd story. 3's my favorite number you know eh? This is the third in my set! Set after Clouds and Trees it wont make much sense at all if you haven't read both of them. The beginning of the next chapter will have a slight recap for those of you with bad memories, or don't want to bother with reading the previous two storeis.

The title was inspired by the song be Evanescence, called 'The Only One', so for those of you who haven't heard the song, well, I have the line from it in this chapter. Look just a little down to see it then I guess... I don't like the idea of putting actual lyrics in with the writing unless it directly interacts with the characters (In which case I listen mostly to Japanese, so chances are it'll be Japanese), so i have the one line right there. So yeah. Thats it

Nishida, Momoka-chan was the name of the japanese student my friend sponsered for a day. Hontou ni arigato gozaimasu! I learned a lot from you! I'll never see you again, but I wont forget what you told me. Truly, thank you very much.

Disclaimer. I do not own the lyrics below, neither the characters that I have not created.

You know you're not the only one

Pre-

'In a sad turn of events, a 20 year old man died yesterday. Before his death, his friends noted a change in his behavior pattern. Rather than being his normal cheerful self, Nakushima Kai became withdrawn and quiet in his last 3 months. Quoted one of his friends, "He slept more each night than the day before. None of us realized till it was too late that he might just not wake up."

He had been hospitalized 5 months earlier after staying the night at his brothers house, due to the fact that he would not wake up, and his skin was cold, although his pulse and breathing seemed to be fine. After a period of time in the hospital his heart rate died down, and his breathing stopped. Clinically dead for 15 minutes, Nobody was sure quite what to do when he started regaining colour, and heating up. 20 minutes after that, his heart restarted and he made a miraculous recovery.

A few weeks after that, he was back to normal. It was only 2 months later that he started acting a bit different, suddenly unable to recognize his own wife and children. Things went downhill from there.

Its not the first time something like this has happened. About a year and a half before he, Nishida Momoka, an 18 year old girl, had very similar but more rapidly progressing symptoms. Only 6 weeks passed after she regained her good health, and she spent only 1 month in decline after that. No other reported cases seem to have come up, no matter where I looked. Should you or anyone you know experience anything like this, we can only assume that the younger you are, the faster it goes. The best idea would be to contact a doctor immediately.

While very little information is available about causes or treatments, a common factor in both cases would be supernatural activity. Both of the victims had contact with supposedly haunted places. Nakushima's brother's house was commonly believe to have a poltergeist of some sort attached to it. Nishida's cousins house, whom she visited prior to her hospitalization also had such a story about it.

For the time being, it has no name. But we have decided to codename it 'Psy Flu', quote, "Because I couldn't think of anything that sounds cooler", says journalist Kuzasu, Aoyame.

Written by Kuzasu Aoyame, freelance journalist'

Ayako scanned the article once more. She really ought to tell someone soon. After all, Mai was younger than the girl mentioned in the article.

But bringing up the topic of someones possible imminent death was hard.

Considering the oddities of the disease, Ayako figured it would be a longer article, and she wouldn't have to search for it online. It was dated for about 3 months ago. Since there was no more about this so called 'Psy Flu', Ayako closed the window, and sighed, shutting down her lap top.

After looking at the computer on her lap. She resolved to tell someone... soon. Maybe it wouldn't happen, and everything would be okay... But Mai's situation did seem really similar... What on earth was she going to do if the symptoms presented themselves, and she still couldn't bring herself to say anything?

"Mai..."