IMPORTANT NOTES:
- Minamino Shuuichi has short hair in this fic! Just so you know.
- Sarayashiki houses both a Junior High School and a High School, so that I can stick everyone together in a familiar place.
- This fic takes place right after the series would've ended (so everyone is 3 years older than they were in the beginning of the series).
- All names will be in Japanese order: family name first.

WARNING: This work of fanfiction will contain some drama and the occasional vague references to homosexuality. This warning counts for the entire fic and will NOT be repeated. You have been warned.

Disclaimer for the entire fic: I don't own YûYû Hakusho or any of the characters from the series, and no matter how much I'd want to, the ownership of these will never be mine. Not even if I put them on my birthday wish list. I made up the 'alternate world' characters though, so they belong to me.

This is one of my first attempts at serious fiction, and my first attempt at writing something YYH related. I haven't seen all of the series, so there might be mistakes here and there.

The idea for this story came to me when I was wondering how Minamino Shuuichi would have turned out if he had never been influenced by Youko Kurama (read: Youko never existed). This let to wondering how everyone in YYH would have turned out if Demon World and Spirit World didn't exist at all. And that led to wondering how the characters from one reality would react to meeting the characters from another reality. Thus, this fanfic was born.

Word count: 892 words

"Stop that guy! He stole my money!"

"Thief! Come back!"

The yelling of the people around him made his heart beat faster. He had to escape, or the police would catch up with him. But where? The arcade was too cramped and busy; if he fled there, they'd catch him for sure. No, he needed a place where he would be able to slip between the crowd, without the officers of the law being able to follow him. Like, say… a supermarket? He knew there was one not too far away. If he could make it in time…

"GOT HIM!" …or not. The hand of a police officer had closed around his wrist painfully; there was no way he'd be able to break free now. The boy who had stolen someone's wallet just a moment before sighed in resignation. He already knew what was going to happen next. It was almost routine by now. First they would take him to the police station, then they would call his parents; he'd been there so many times, they didn't even bother asking for his name anymore. They just shook their heads and said "Oh, it's you again" before making the call.

After that, his parents would come to pick him up. They would first spend several minutes apologising to the officers for their son causing trouble, they would make him apologise as well, and they would drive home again. No lecture, though. They'd given up on that after the first dozen arrests or so. It never had any effect on him anyway. He would simply nod and say "I'll never do it again", and two days later he would be caught stealing batteries or something similar.

In short, Minamino Shuuichi wasn't a very easy child to raise. (1)

Indeed, three hours later found Shuuichi sitting in his room at home. His room was rather messy; fantasy books were laying around haphazardly, his schoolbag was thrown in a corner and a pile of old CDs which he never listened to anymore was accumulating dust on the other side of the room. Shuuichi lay down on the bed and closed his eyes.

'I hate it when I get caught. Every time it happens mom just looks at me as if I never should've been born. And my father- no, STEPfather; he thinks he can tell me what to do with my life! Pffft, he's not even related to me. And my stepbrother is a nightmare, always acting really annoying. He can't even study for himself, but takes my books to copy down everything… loser.' Shuuichi rolled on his side and continued with his mental tirade. 'I really hate my life. I know I'm no saint, and I know I shouldn't steal, but mom could at least try to pay less attention to her husband and stepbrother and more to me. She acts as if I don't exist at all…'

Shuuichi had not always been the juvenile delinquent he was now. He had been a normal teenager with normal grades and normal behaviour. It had slowly started to change, however, when Shiori announced she had a new boyfriend. 'A boyfriend! When she's already thirty-seven!' Shuuichi had not been happy with having to share his mother. He had soon started to cause trouble to get attention from her; it only worked for a short time though. Eventually, Shiori had told him that she was going to marry Hatanaka-san. But the worst news was when she said that Hatanaka's son was named Shuuichi too. And that was the final straw. Minamino Shuuichi turned to stealing. (2)

After stealing for so many times, it was only natural that he had gotten a reputation for troublemaking everywhere he went. Even the other students at school were mostly avoiding him now; the only person that even talked to him was Yukimura Keiko. (3) This was not entirely because of her gentleness and her will to make everyone around her happy. It was because of her former (unofficial) boyfriend. Urameshi Yuusuke had been just as much of a punk as Shuuichi was now: skipping classes, smoking, drinking and the occasional theft had made up most of his life… until he had been hit by a car. The only real consolation Keiko got was that he died almost instantly, with only a brief moment of pain. (4)

Sometimes Shuuichi felt Keiko didn't even care about him, but talked to him only because he was so much like Urameshi. He only acted as a replacement of sorts. 'Heh, I wonder… if I didn't act so much like Urameshi, would she still talk to me? Probably not. She just feels comfortable around me because of my attitude.' Shuuichi often let himself dwell on such depressive thoughts right after arrest. He just couldn't help it.

But today, he had decided to do at least a bit of his homework before calling it a night. The new physics teacher had given a very interesting assignment: write down any theory you can come up with explaining time travel, the existence of other dimensions, or anything similar. Contrary to his other homework, this assignment actually sounded as if it might be fun, and he needed to do at least part of his homework if he wanted to pass. So Shuuichi took some paper and a pen, and started to write…

(1) – Bet you didn't see that one coming!

(2) – So basically, Minamino Shuuichi is being awfully angsty and rather unreasonable, feeling he's being replaced with Hatanaka Shuuichi. This sort of thing (becoming a juvenile delinquent to get attention from your parents) happens in real life too. Unfortunately.

(3) – Since he's not a genius like the Minamino Shuuichi we know, he's not attending Meiou High School. Also, after the introduction of Hatanaka, not just his behaviour but also his grades have been getting worse, so he got held back a year… now, he's attending the one school which would accept (err…) a juvenile delinquent: Sarayashiki High School.

(4) – Yes, Yuusuke is dead. Or at least the one from this reality is.

Posted: May 22, 2007
Next chapter: The Science Museum