ANNOUNCEMENT: THIS IS NOT A RxM FANFIC! - Just to clear things up a bit…

October 25- Sakurai High, Rooftop - 12:10 p.m.

"Youichi, it's time you told us the truth," said Natsume.

"It would be the right time to tell us now," Ruka agreed.

Youichi shook his head. He was afraid to tell them the truth. He didn't want them to think that he had been lying to them his whole life. "I can't!" he exclaimed, "I-I mean, not at school! Mikan might suddenly appear any minute you know!"

"I already took care of that problem," Natsume replied, "Today is Imai's birthday. Polka Dots to currently at the school library with her. She says that she wants to spend as much time as possible with her best friend."

"R-Right…" replied Youichi Sakura. He closed his eyes and sighed. He really had no choice. He would have to tell them eventually anyway.

Youichi closed his dark green eyes. His body started glowing as he began to grow shorter. His body features turned more into a child's features.

Natsume and Ruka noticed the sky was beginning to turn the same red bloody color. When Youichi stopped glowing, the sky turned back to its original light blue color. Natsume's eyes widened. It was Youichi Hijiri as a seven year old. "I-It's really you… Youichi Hijiri…"

Youichi nodded, "Yes, my real name is Youichi Hijiri. Even though right now I appear to be seven years old, I'm actually seventeen, one year older than you."

"W-Wait, older?! But when you were in Alice Academy with us, you were our kohai!" Ruka exclaimed.

"I'll explain…" the seven-year-old Youichi replied.

- Youichi's Memory - Five years ago

I was thirteen-years-old when Persona had me take this task. I arrived to his office not expecting what he was going to give me.

"Persona, I'm here," I said. "What is this task you were talking about last night?"

"I want you to spy on Natsume Hyuuga for me," Persona said. I had no idea how I was going to spy on the rumored Natsume Hyuuga he was talking about until he handed me a piece of candy.

"What the heck is this?" I asked. I mean, anyone would have thought from first sight, How was a piece of candy going to help? or Had Persona finally gone nuts?

"Look carefully," Persona replied, "It's a Gulliver Candy."

I took the candy to inspect it. On the wrapper it had the Gulliver Candy logo, underneath the logo was a negative number. "Negative ten?" I said to myself, "No way… this is…"

"Yes," Persona replied, "I want you to eat this and have the power to change your age the way you want. Then, you can enter the preschool division of Gakuen Alice as a three-year-old single star student."

"Oh, and don't worry about the side effects," he added, "I only want you to spy on him for a couple of days, that's all."

Persona told me that I had to invade the preschool division so I could act as an innocent preschooler. As a preschooler, I could spy on Natsume Hyuuga and report his activities. Persona wanted to know what Natsume was doing all the time (Natsume was always skipping his duties after all).

"Please eat the candy now," Persona said.

As I opened the wrapper, I noticed that the candy was a slight pinkish color with a -10 printed on it. To be honest, just looking at the candy intimidated me. I was afraid to the extreme. I heard from some people that there were side effects to this candy. For example, never being able to go back to my original age. But there were pretty cool side effects also, like, being able to change my age whenever I wanted for eternity.

Most people, however, who ate this candy, had their ages changed for a day or two, then it would wear off. I hoped that that was the case for me.

As I ate the candy my body glowed. In a blink of an eye, I turned into a three-year-old who could hardly speak in complete sentences.

"What the heck just happened?!" my three-year-old body exclaimed. Well… that WAS what I was trying to say but it came out as, "Wha hapwend?!" My sentences didn't come out right. It felt strange.

Persona smirked and pat my head, "No worries Hijiri. You'll turn back soon. Let me lead you to the preschool dorm."

The next day I met Natsume who was twelve-years-old at the time. He and I quickly became friends and soon Natsume began acting as my older brother. It was odd at first, but as days passed, my thoughts when I transformed began thinking like a three-year-old.

After two days, Persona and I found out that one of the side effects had struck me. I was allowed to switch my age from a ten year difference whenever I wanted. Persona told me that this was a great convenience for him since I could spy on Natsume longer.

A year later, when I turned fourteen, Persona had come up with an even greater plan for me. He decided to take advantage of my new ability to change my age.

"Hijiri, I would like you to enter the human world," he said to me.

I remember staring at him in amazement. "But why?" I asked (actually my voice was in a four-year-old form but I'll just translate the gibberish to you).

Persona handed me a two picture. On one of the pictures there was a thirteen-year-old human girl with hazel eyes. "This is Mikan Sakura," he told me. Then he took out a bottle of blue stuff and handed it to me. "And this is an attract potion Luna made, just for Mikan Sakura's family. With this, you can make them want to adopt you."

"Wait! Why would you want me to get adopted into this family?" I asked.

"I want you to gain Mikan Sakura's trust. Then, once you have her complete trust, I would like you to kill her."

"K-Kill?" I said. I didn't want to kill anyone, but knowing the consequences Persona would give, I had no choice but to accept the task.

Persona gave me three days to prepare for the trip. At that time, the necklaces Natsume and Ruka had when they came to the human world were not invented. There were teleporting machines though.

However, there was a problem included with the machines. Once a person went to the human world, there was no machine to bring them back to the alice world. In other words, I would be stuck there for the rest of my life. That didn't sound very pleasing to me… However, Persona promised me that Luna would invent a way to bring me back by the time I turned seventeen so I agreed to go.

Basically, I was to kill Mikan when I turned seventeen. Then Luna would return me to the alice world.

Three days later I arrived back to Persona's office. The plan was to originally have me turn into my four-year-old form and become Mikan Sakura's younger brother, but some things happened and I ended up teleporting to the human world as a fourteen-year-old and becoming Mikan's older brother instead.

Well, this is what happened on the day I teleported to the human world:

Natsume Hyuuga blasted into the office with fire in his hand. His eyes glared at Persona in anger. "WHAT THE HECK DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING PERSONA?! YOUICHI IS ONLY FOUR! YOU CAN'T JUST LET HIM DO A MISSION ALONE!" he shouted.

I looked at Natsume with teary eyes, "Natsume-nii..." I was astonished. How did he know I was doing a mission?

Persona rolled his eyes, "Four is old enough. If he doesn't work, he'll be kicked out. Understand, Hyuuga?"

"AT LEAST LET ME GO WITH HIM! WHERE IS HE GOING?! TELL ME PERSONA!"

"I'm sorry Hyuuga, but I can not release that information to you. The only thing I'll tell you is that he will be a spy for who knows how many years. That is all." Persona replied.

"WHAT THE HELL PERSONA! GIVE ME BACK YOUICHI!" Natsume exclaimed. All the sudden, he clutched onto his heart. I knew that it had to be that heart disease he was born with. I ran to help him, but being in my helpless four-year-old form, I was pushed away from helping him by Persona.

I looked at Natsume. I wanted to tell him the truth before I left for good, the truth behind my age. I had to tell him that I was actually fourteen, not four. I didn't want to lie to him anymore. "Natsume-nii... the truth is I'm not-"

Persona pushed me away. "Shut up Hijiri."

"Ah!" I cried, "Wait!"

Natsume kneeled to the ground. His breath was so heavy that even I could hear it. "No... Youichi... I can't... let you... go..." Then Natsume collapsed.

"NATSUME-NII!" I cried I tried to run from Persona's grasp. "LET ME GO PERSONA!"

Persona ignored my comment and pushed me into the teleporter to the human world.

I tried to fight back before Persona pushed me to the teleporter. I wanted to at least say goodbye. I tried transforming back to his fourteen-year-old form to fight. By the way, that's how I ended up spying as a fourteen-year-old instead.

No matter how much I tried, I knew that I would never be stronger than Persona. But I couldn't help it, I just had to help Natsume. However, it was all futile. Persona pushed the fourteen-year-old me into the teleporter and pushed the button to activate the machine. Then, a bright light blinded my eyes, ruining my sight of the alice world and Natsume.

When I arrived to the human world, I was next to an orphanage laying on a patch of grass. I guessed that the orphanage was the place Persona wanted me to go.

I slowly sat up and noticed a lump on my pocket. I put my hand in and noticed that it was the blue potion Luna had given me. Then, I heard a door creak open. It was an old woman. I quickly hid my potion and got up.

The woman noticed my presence and shouted to me, "Oh! Are you alright child? Let me help you!"

After that, I was taken into the orphanage. The old lady led me to a room. The room was pretty small and I had to share it with a lot of other orphans, but it felt warm. For the first time in my life, I felt at home.

Then, I suddenly remembered the potion Persona gave me. He told me to drink it. To be honest, I really didn't want to, I mean, who really wants to drink blue stuff with unknown ingredients and odd smell.

Well, I drank it eventually and the next day there were a bunch of men in suits saying that I was wanted for the Sakura family. As soon as the old lady heard the word Sakura her eyes widened. The Sakura family must have been a famous rich family, I guessed.

-End of Youichi's Memory-

"Then I met Mikan Sakura. At that time, she was thirteen," Youichi said as he transformed back into his seventeen-year-old body.

"Ah… I see… So Mikan belongs to a rich family…" Natsume said.

Youichi suddenly put his hand up, "W-Wait! Don't tell her I told you about the Sakura family being rich… Mikan is a bit touchy about that…"

Ruka was confused. He didn't understand what was wrong with being rich but then again he wasn't rich so he wouldn't understand.

"So, you guys aren't mad at me?" Youichi asked.

"Of course not! It wasn't you right? It was Persona! It's not like you had a choice!" Ruka exclaimed.

"And um… the reason why I didn't kill her yet is because…I just can't… I really see her as my younger sister now and… and-"

"Eh? What are you doing here?" a voice asked.

Natsume, Ruka, and Youichi turned around. It was Youichi Fujioka, Youichi Hijiri's clone. All of them started to fret. They were worried that Fujioka had heard their conversation.

Youichi Fujioka flipped his hair with his fingers. "What the heck are you guys doing?" he asked. They looked worried about something... he thought.

Ruka knew he had to say something quick or else Fujioka would get suspicious. "Um… Fujioka-kun! Umm… by any chance, are you rich too?" Ruka asked.

Youichi Fujioka looked at him oddly, "Well duhhh, that's why I'm engaged to Mikan obviously!" Then he looked at Youichi Hijiri, "Oh, yeah! I was looking for you Senpai! Come on! I wanna learn more about Mikan!"

"Umm… Okay, sure Fujioka-kun," Youichi Hijiri replied.

"You know, I would tell you to just call me Youichi since you'll be my future brother-in-law but then I would get mixed up on whether you're talking to me or yourself," Youichi Fujioka said, "So I guess the closest thing you can call me is by my last name isn't it… Well, that's alright too… Just call me whatever you want alright, Senpai?"

"Sure Fujioka-kun!" Youichi Hijiri replied. Then he turned to Natsume and Ruka, "See you later guys!"

- Hotaru's House - 4:00 p.m.

"Happy Birthday Hotaru!" exclaimed Mikan.

Hotaru looked at Mikan, "Oh, Mikan… You're finally here, late again I see, even to your best friend's birthday party…Even your brother is earlier than you."

"G-Gomen, Hotaru!" exclaimed Mikan, "Anyway, I got you the best birthday present ever!"

Mikan held the present up to Hotaru. Hotaru looked at it from different directions to guess what was in the box.

"Is it money?" Hotaru asked bluntly.

Mikan sweatdropped. Hotaru was just a money lover, of course she would want money. "Umm… no… It's something even better!"

"Even better?" asked Hotaru, "What's better than money?"

"Oi! You two! Get over here! We are gonna cut the cake!" exclaimed Koko from inside.

In Hotaru's birthday party, she invited Mikan, Natsume, Ruka, the two Youichi's, Koko, Sumire, and Yuu, basically all her friends from school. She would have games for the party, but the party was after school. Everyone still had to do homework after this, so she made her party quick. After all, Hotaru's main priorities were always money and grades.

After singing happy birthday to Hotaru, the group ate the cake while Hotaru opened the presents.

"I guess I'll open Nogi's and Hyuuga's present first…" said Hotaru.

Hotaru opened the present. There were two boxes in the present. One of them said From: Ruka and the other said From: Natsume. Hotaru opened Ruka's first. In it was a stuffed rabbit.

"Haha, that's so like you Ruka-pyon! It's so cute!" Mikan exclaimed.

Ruka blushed at Mikan's statement, "Y-You really think so? I.. umm…"

Natsume glared at the sight of Ruka and Mikan blushing together. They were talking so much that they didn't even notice the rest of the people around them. Natsume noticed that he was feeling the same feeling he was having the other day. His heart tightened. "Ahem," he coughed, "Imai, open my gift," he said loudly to interrupt Ruka's and Mikan's conversation.

Hotaru opened the box. In it was a bunch of paper. "What's this? I don't need printing paper…"

"Turn the papers over," replied Natsume.

Hotaru turned the papers. On the other side was a picture of a blond boy with bright blue eyes. He was cross-dressing as a girl in all the pictures. One of them was in a odd school uniform (the Gakuen Alice school uniform) for girls and another was in a kimono. "Hmm… these pictures of Nogi can go for a big price…" she said.

Ruka cringed at the sound of his last name. No… Natsume couldn't have... He slowly turned around and looked at the pictures. "... Natsume…"

"Yeah?" replied Natsume.

"WHY DOES IMAI-SAN HAVE THESE PICTURES?!" Ruka shouted in embarrassment.

Unfortunately, his shouting made everyone want to look at the pictures.

"Hey, Ruka-kun! Lookin' good!" Koko exclaimed as he looked at the picture of Ruka in a miniskirt.

Sumire picked up a picture of Ruka in a cat costume. "Wah! Look Koko! It's a neko!" she said excitingly.

"Whoa you really do look like a girl in here!" Yuu exclaimed as his looked at a picture with Ruka in a strapless dress.

Ruka's eyes widened. He was obviously not happy about the pictures. "NATSUME! YOU PROMISED YOU WOULDN'T SHOW ANYONE THESE!" Ruka cried.

Natsume sniggered, "Well, I had to get rid of them somehow. They were getting in the way…"

"How did you get these?" Hotaru asked.

"Last year, our school was having a festival. The guys had to cross-dress as girls while the girls cross-dressed as guys…"

"What the heck is up with that?" Koko laughed.

Ruka hid in a corner in embarrassment. "Wah… why Natsume… You betrayed me…"

Yuu pat Ruka's back. "Don't worry Nogi-kun! I'm sure Hotaru-chan won't be so mean to sell-"

"Hmm… I wonder how much I should auction these off for…" Hotaru said in deep thought.

"I'm a goner," Ruka said, "Goodbye world…"

Natsume looked at his watch, "Shoot, I'm gonna be late."

"Late for what?" Mikan asked.

"I have to meet Hanazono today," Natsume replied, "Bye guys." Then Natsume ran off.

Mikan felt a heavy feeling on her chest when she heard Natsume say Misaki Hanazono's name. ...What could they be talking about... she wondered, They were talking yesterday at the park too... Don't tell me… Natsume likes older girls?!

Ruka looked at Mikan with concern, "Sakura-san, you look ill… Are you alright?"

"H-Huh? Y-Yeah… I'm fine…" Mikan replied with a blush on her face.

-Hospital- 4:50 p.m.

"Gosh Hyuuga-kun! You're really late!" Misaki exclaimed.

"Gomen, it was one of my friend's birthdays today so I was a bit busy," Natsume replied.

"Eh? You could have just called me and told me to meet you another day!"

"I don't have a cell phone."

"Oh," Misaki replied, "WAIT WHAT?!" She was pretty surprised. This was the first seventeen-year-old she ever met who didn't have a cell phone and didn't look like he really wanted one either.

"Yeah, I don't have one. Got a problem?" Natsume asked.

"You're seventeen, aren't you? You should have a cell phone by now…"

"Hmm… I should? I'll ask Tsubasa about it later…"

"Anyway! About yesterday's conversation," Misaki reminded.

"Yeah, that's what I came for. Anyway, why would I be jealous?"

Misaki slammed her palm on her forehead, "Hyuuga-kun… HOW MANY TIMES DO I HAVE TO TELL YOU BAKA!"

A lot of people started staring at her again. "Hanazono is quite the feisty one…" a doctor said. The nurse next to him agreed.

"Misaki, stop embarrassing yourself," Natsume hissed.

Misaki took a deep breath to calm herself down, "You're jealous of Ruka Nogi."

"Why?" Natsume asked.

Misaki swore that she wanted to bang Natsume on the wall a hundred times for not listening to her but decided to restrain herself. "You're jealous of the attention Sakura-san is giving to Nogi-kun."

"Attention? Why?"

"Because you're in love with Sakura-san."

"Ah, I see… WAIT WHAT?!" Natsume shouted. The loudness of his voice attracted a lot of attention.

Misaki's voiced turned into a whisper. "Like I said-"

"W-W-Why w-would I be in love w-with Polka Dots, stupid?!" Natsume exclaimed. Natsume could feel his cheeks warming up. His heart beat went faster than usual.

"Natsume Hyuuga-kun, you are really obvious," Misaki replied, "Anyway, you don't HAVE to believe me but just by looking at you, we all know it's true!"

"N-Nonsense! I-I'm leaving! Tsubasa is waiting for me at home! Bye!" Natsume quickly ran out the door and left the hospital.

"Don't worry Hyuuga-kun! I'll support your love!" Misaki shouted to Natsume before he left.

Natsume turned away in embarrassment. He could feel a bunch of stares on his back. Ugh… Hanazono.. you did it again…

-The Apartment- 5:30 p.m.

"Tsubasa, Ruka, I'm home!" Natsume exclaimed. He noticed Tsubasa wearing a strange uniform. "What's that?" he asked.

"Ah this? I got a part-time job from this family business called Sakura by the Sakura family," Tsubasa replied.

Sakura family? Mikan's family?! Natsume pondered. "Oh, I see… Anyway, we need to talk about Misaki Hanazono with Youichi Hijiri. I know you have been avoiding it Tsubasa but we don't have a choice."

"Oh…" Tsubasa's eyes suddenly turned sad, "I-I see… When?"

"This Sunday," Ruka said, "We already arranged the time with Youichi Sakur-"

"Ruka! Tsubasa! Can you feel this eerie aura!?" Natsume said suddenly.

Ruka ran toward the curtains and opened them. "No way…" he said.

Tsubasa and Natsume looked out the window. The sky was back to that unnatural bloody color again.

Ruka suddenly heard a feminine scream in his head. The female voice was screaming the name Youichi over and over again. Ruka had no idea how only he could hear the voice and not Tsubasa or Natsume. That was when Natsume remembered something.

Flashback from Chapter 3:

"Here take this," Natsume said.

Natsume handed her a silver chain. Mikan stared at it and asked, "What's this for?"

"It's a navigation device, if you're in trouble we'll know and come right away. This way, we won't have to stay with you 24/7."

"Wahhh! A-arigato..." Mikan said with a slight blush.

"Now take it and put it on already," Natsume said.

Mikan put the silver chain around her neck. It seemed to fit perfectly.

"Hey Natsume, isn't that suppose to be your chain so we can contact each other anywhere? We only have two of those you know,"said Ruka.

"Hmph, I don't need something like that. I'm already capable of protecting myself," Natsume replied confidently, "Besides, I trust that you'll tell me whenever you can hear Mikan's voice in trouble right, Ruka?"

-End of Flashback-

"Natsume… It's Sakura-san! She and Youichi are in danger! At…" Ruka began to navigate again. His eyes were closed tightly. Natsume could tell he was trying his best to find the exact location. "At Sakura-san's house!" he exclaimed.

-End of Chapter 14-

Sorry about the late post! I was studying for my entrance exams!

Anyway, Happy New Year! If you want to reread the part when Mikan gets the necklace again, it's in Chapter 3!

Please review! And this isn't a RxM fanfic!

- Metallic Snow