"Let's keep going."

Alex looked back at Kade, who had gone off to stand in the corner. He waved him forward and made everyone else stand in a wide ring in the center of the room. No one knew what Alex had in mind, as usual. His style of teaching was eccentric and didn't conform to any set curriculum, as far as they knew. The students, with the exception of Hideo and Mikan, didn't even know what his Alice was.

"Mr. Brown," a student called, addressing Alex by his last name.

"Hmm?"

"What is this?"

This referred to the set up Alex and the other instructors were putting together, using part of Kade's ability to conjure materials as well as utilizing some equipment lying around the room. When they were finished, an extremely dangerous obstacle course wound through the training room. Thankfully, there was sufficient space as the room was quite large in order to accommodate 22 Dangerous Ability students, trainers and allow for all kinds of different methods of training to be implemented.

"We're going to be testing you and your partner with this exercise today."

"What?!" 22 collective voices yelled at the same time.

"Yup." Another instructor stepped up. She smirked at her students and then addressed the rest of the crowd.

"You're going to be working together with your partner to get through this obstacle course. It consists of three parts."

She gestured to the course behind her.

"The first part is going to be a strength as well as a mental test combined in one. You're going to solve the questions that us instructors will be giving you while simultaneously carrying 50 kilogram boulders on each of your shoulders. In order to clear the first part, you have to total 500 kilograms and answer all of the problems the instructors ask you correctly. The time limit is 10 minutes. If you can't pass the first course in one try, you must total 1000 kilograms the second time, 2000 the third and so on."

The instructor described the three parts of the obstacle course, each course more difficult than the last. Mikan and Hideo grasped each other's hand, working through a mental game plan through her Telepathy Alice.

"Everyone ready?" Alex called from the other side of the room. He raised a small air gun and fired. In a rush of movement, the students began the obstacle course from hell.

Mikan and Hideo held back a bit, analyzing the landscape. With this type of exercise, they knew Alex wasn't looking for their strength or their intelligence. He was looking for cleverness, wit and out-of-the-box thinking that would outsmart the mastermind himself. As soon as the pair saw Alex putting together the courses, they knew there would be some kind of trick.

Alex watched his students from his side, seeing the imaginary wheels turning in their little heads. They're so small and yet they've grown so much, he thought, chuckling to himself when Mikan dropped her boulder on her foot and hopped around in pain. He checked the timer to see how much time had passed.

3 minutes and 24 seconds. Not bad. Not bad at all.

From what he could see, only a few pairs had made it through the first course in that time, one of them being Hideo and Mikan. Thankfully, they knew what he was up to and figured out the trick to the course. The other pairs were struggling a bit more than usual but they would figure it out eventually. He scoffed. Might take them a little more time.

"Alright!" Alex heard a familiar whoop of elation from the course. He chuckled to himself as he looked back up at the students progressing through the stages.

"Mikan, you have to take this boulder. We're still a little short on the weight."

"Unggggg." Very attractive, Mikan.

"Weight's good. Questions all answered. First course is cleared." The instructor waved them forward. Mikan groaned and dropped the boulders noisily, rubbing her poor aching shoulders.

"Wait, you two. Before you proceed, come over here." The pair heard Alex's voice carrying over to them. They trudged past the other students, settling next to him.

"Mikan. Hideo."

They flinched, Mikan's hand wrapping around Hideo's. Alex was usually a tough-love type of instructor so he never called them by their first names unless he expected them to take him completely seriously.

"We found Hideo's parents."

A moment of silence ensued. Hideo's eyes had widened in shock, his hand tightening around hers. Mikan stood stock still, then slowly turned her head.

"What?" she asked quietly, as Hideo seemed to be speechless. Alex turned to face them, his stoic face giving nothing away.

"We found them."

Hideo kept staring at Alex's face, then turned around slowly. He suddenly punched the wall, startling both Mikan and Alex. He punched and punched and punched, over and over and over again until his knuckles bled profusely.

"Stop it." Mikan grabbed his arm to stop him from completely ruining his knuckles and in the process, got a look at his face. Tears streamed down silently as his eyes pleaded with her in anguish. She hated seeing him like this.

Ever since he was discovered as an Alice from a very young age, his parents fled from Japan, in fear for their son's life. They had no knowledge of either branches of Alice Academy in Japan and London so thought fleeing to London would be better since they would have no need to hide anything from anyone they knew. Of course, they knew they would have to keep him hidden for the rest of his life but they were alright with that as long as they were separated from everyone they knew and loved.

At the time, Hideo had no knowledge of how to control his powers and thus began to experiment by himself to satisfy his curiosity, as any child would. He innocently played around the house, conjuring things from thin air with his Dark Matter. What he didn't know was his desires were being projected into those object as well…

"Hideo," Mikan murmured worriedly. "Are you alright?"

Hideo didn't process her words. The tears didn't stop flowing as he replayed the night where everything went wrong.

"Mommy, can I get the new Superman figurine from Toys 'R Us?" A young 5-year-old Hideo pleaded.

"No sweetie, we don't have time to go there but Mommy will get it for your next birthday. How about that?" his mother replied distractedly, flitting about her study. She was a well-known astrophysicist and so was preparing to give a lecture at the nearby college. Her husband, Hideo's father, was a decent author, well-versed Japanese Literature. He was currently holed up in his own study, working on a piece that was due in a week.

"But Mommy, my birthday isn't for so long," Hideo whined.

"Well, I'm sorry, honey but both Mommy and Daddy are busy right now so let's talk about this later, ok?"

Hideo watched as his mother pulled out of the driveway through the window. He huffed and stomped to his room.

Later that night, the Tateyuki's were having a late dinner as his mother's lecture had run a bit longer than she thought and his father couldn't pry himself from his computer. Hideo, being the little kid he was, couldn't sit still in his seat.

"Hideo, eat your vegetables," his mother scolded.

"No, they're icky," he complained. He laid down his fork and started playing with a conjured toy. His parents stared at the toy, never having seen his powers in person. They had only known something was wrong with him the moment he was born, because there were black specks dotting his body.

"Hideo?" his father called neutrally. "What do you have in your hand?" His voice betrayed him, wobbling a little bit in nervousness.

"Hmm?" he answered. "Oh it's my toy!" He jumped up and down in his seat. "Mommy, Daddy, guess what! I can make anything out of this black sand!" He giggled innocently, unaware of the horrified looks starting to take over his parents' faces. They glanced at each other in fear. When Hideo had been put to bed, they sat down with grim looks on their faces.

"We can't live with him like this. There's no way we are raising a child with strange abilities."

"What do we do?"

"What CAN we do?"

Tears started to well up in the corners of his mother's eyes at the thought that had occurred to her.

"Honey, what? What did you think of?"

"... We have to leave."

His father immediately shook his head.

"No. We can't. He's still 5 for crying out loud!" he exclaimed. Unbeknownst to the two of them, Hideo had gotten out of bed at the sound of voices downstairs. He stood hidden behind a wall, listening in shock at what his mother was saying.

"We have no choice," she sobbed. "I can't live knowing my child is turning into some kind of monster. What if he starts to use those powers against us?"

"I know he won't!" his father defended. "He's not a bad kid. If we raise him well, he won't ever have any negative feelings against us."

"I still can't live in the same house as him. I just can't…" his mother broke down, curling in on herself as if her heart was being ripped apart. His father gazed brokenhearted at his wife. He sighed and ran his hands through his hair violently. He paced around the room, desperately thinking of a solution to their child's problem. Finding none, he came to a conclusion.

"Alright."

His mother looked up, surprised.

"What?"

"Alright. We'll leave right now. It's the only way he can live without us being too overbearing or shutting him out completely. I know you can't accept the things he's been born with and frankly, neither can I." He quietly gathered the spare cash he kept in his safe. "We'll leave him food and money so he can take care of himself. Write him a note of everything he should remember. I'll go get some of our clothes." He went upstairs to their bedroom, unwittingly passing by Hideo, stuffing a suitcase with as many things as he could.

Downstairs, his mother wrote their beloved son a final note, tears still streaming down her face.

"I'm sorry, Hideo," she whispered tearfully. "But this is the only way we can accept you."

Hideo, hearing his mother's apology, began to cry silently, knowing it would be the last time he saw his parents. He hunched over and bit his hand to keep from making any noise. He was mature enough that he knew his parents were leaving him because of his powers. Suddenly, a wave of rage rose within him. He dashed out in front of the two of them, startling them.

"Why?!" he screamed. "Why are you leaving me?!" He conjured random objects and threw them, pelting them over and over again. "All this time you acted like loving parents but just because you saw something strange, you're leaving me?! You should be accepting me the way I am! If you don't accept me, then who will?!" he cried. In his despair, he hadn't realized his parents were on the ground, unconscious. When he came to, he saw the unmoving forms of his parents.

"Mommy?" his voice shook in fear. "Daddy?" He ran over to them and tried to shake them awake.

"Mommy! Daddy! Wake up! Please wake up!" he sobbed. "Please…"

It turned out that the things that Hideo had hit his parents with were filled with his rage and despair, which overwhelmed their brains to the point of knocking them unconscious. His emotions were so strong that he had wiped their memory clean of him. By the time Hideo had calmed down, instructors of the London Branch of Alice Academy had found him because of the immense amount of energy he had emitted. When they came to, Hideo was gone and they had no memory of ever having a son.