H o s h i - g a - H o s h i i - d e s u

"I want the stars"

by Lucathia

chapter 18: Found

Sora stared unseeingly at the closed door. She had looked everywhere...in the bedrooms, the guest room, the family room, the bathrooms, the closets...under the beds, the tables, the bookshelf...outside the windows...beyond the front door...everywhere she could think of.

Tsuki was nowhere to be found.

Sora had been in the kitchen, preparing the food she was going to cook for dinner that night as Hoshi left to go to cram school. When she was done, she had walked out of the kitchen only to find that she was home alone.

She twiddled her fingers nervously. It had already been a few hours since she discovered that Tsuki had disappeared. She had called the police, who told her that they couldn't do anything until her son was considered "missing" after 24 hours. Sora had slammed the receiver down when she heard that. It had been out of character for her to lose her calm, but the disappearance of her son destroyed all the self-restraint she had. However, right after she slammed the phone down, she picked it back up and called the police back to ask them if anyone had brought Tsuki to the police station.

Sora found no luck with that either, and now she couldn't sit still anymore.

She had to go out to find her son, the only person she had left after the death of her husband and her older son. Her parents didn't accept her. The entire Asakura family was disappointed in her. Tsuki was the only one who accepted her…

An image of Hoshi eating contently at the breakfast table flashed in her mind.

Sora calmed slightly at the thought of Hoshi. She wasn't alone. She still had Hoshi. She kept gazing at the door, this time actually seeing the door. A year ago when she had found Hoshi, he was silent and didn't talk much. But now, Hoshi seemed to have opened up to her and Tsuki much more. He was always calm and self-assured. Sora decided to wait for Hoshi to return from cram school before rushing out blindly to search for Tsuki.

She waited for what seemed like eternity. Finally, the door slowly opened, revealing her adopted son Hoshi who exclaimed, "I'm home!"

Sora quickly murmured, "Welcome home." She saw that a short boy carrying a huge book was standing behind Hoshi, but Sora didn't have time to greet him.

"I'm home!" declared the boy clad in a pair of green pants and a white, unbuttoned shirt. His claw necklace rested in front of his chest. He pushed his orange headphones back a bit as he entered the inn.

"You're late, once again," was the icy reply that the boy got in return for his warm announcement that he was home. It was far from the warm "welcome home" that he was yearning for.

The boy winced slightly. "Sorry, Anna. I had a little detour along the way."

Anna had her back to Yoh, so Yoh couldn't see the exasperated expression on her face and Anna didn't see the little boy behind Yoh. Anna began turning around as she said, "I don't care about your detour! You weren't home to make din…!"

Anna stopped in the middle of her sentence. The cause? Her eyes came upon the little boy who was hiding behind Yoh. Yoh also had an extremely sheepish and apologetic look on his face.

Anna blinked and pointed at the boy huddling behind Yoh. "What. Is. That?"

"Uh…a boy?" answered Yoh.

"I know that he's a boy! I'm asking you who is he? Why is he here?" Anna stared down at Tsuki unblinkingly. That boy…Anna couldn't help but notice that the boy looked a lot like Yoh. It couldn't be that the little boy was…Yoh's child? Anna shook her head. She shouldn't let her imagination run like that. Yoh wasn't old enough to have a child the age of that boy.

Tsuki cowered under Anna's scrutinizing stare. He tugged on Yoh's shirt and pointed a shaky finger in the general proximity of Anna. Tsuki whispered, "She's scary."

Anna closed her eyes when her ears caught Tsuki's whisper. She was about to explode.

Yoh winced and motioned with his hands for Tsuki not to say anything else to provoke Anna.

Anna took in deep breaths to calm herself down. She opened her eyes, glared down at Tsuki, and demanded, "Name?"

Tsuki looked towards Yoh, who nodded his head for Tsuki to continue. "I'm Asakura Tsu…"

Upon hearing Tsuki say "Asakura," Anna exclaimed, "WHAT? What did you say?" Anna turned towards Yoh. "What's the meaning of this?"

Yoh blinked. "What?"

Anna counted to three before slapping Yoh across the face.

Horo Horo was enjoying his soak in the hot springs when he heard a loud slap resound throughout the inn. He winced for Yoh's sake and hoped that the inn's customers didn't get scared from Anna's violent tendencies.

He dried himself off, got dressed, and started plodding towards the direction of the front of the inn. Since Yoh was back, Horo Horo wanted to ask him why he had ignored him in the streets.

Horo Horo slid open the door to the front.

"Welcome back Yoh!" Horo Horo's loud exclamation echoed within the silent room. He blinked and looked back and forth between Anna and Yoh. "What's wrong?" It was then that he noticed Tsuki's presence.

"How cute!" exclaimed Horo Horo. He plodded over towards Tsuki, knelt down, and started patting Tsuki on the head. "You're a little too tall to be koropokkuru though," said Horo Horo with a sigh. "Too bad."

Horo Horo glanced up at Yoh with a raised eyebrow. "So Yoh, today..."

Anna cut Horo Horo's sentence off as she pointed her finger at Tsuki. "Explain him to me, Yoh."

Yoh sweatdropped. "Well…as I mentioned before, I went on a little detour on the way home…"

"Get to the main point."

Horo Horo again continued with his question. "Uh...Yoh...today when I saw..."

However, Yoh wasn't listening to Horo Horo, since he was still answering Anna's question. "Um…all right. I was walking in the middle of the street when he called me "Hoshi-niichan" and pulled on my shirt. Apparently, he was lost and couldn't find his way home. By the way, his name is Asakura Tsuki."

Anna glared. "Am I supposed to take your word for it?"

Yoh nodded slowly.

Anna sighed. "Fine. I'll believe you then. But it's too much of a coincidence that his surname is Asakura!"

Yoh grinned. "It is such a coincidence! I think he might be my cousin! Wouldn't that be cool?"

Horo Horo cut into the conversation with no regard to what was previously said. He just wanted his question answered. He had been ignored for long enough.

"Hey Yoh…why did you ignore me when I called your name earlier today?"

Yoh turned around. "When did you call my name? Just now?"

"No! I mean, yes, but I also called your name when I passed you in the street across the bakery store around the corner."

Yoh blinked. "I didn't go that way today."

Horo Horo paused, letting Yoh's answer sink in before murmuring, "Really..." He glanced at Yoh and said in a louder voice, "I could have sworn that I saw you! I kept calling your name but you didn't turn around."

His words caught Tsuki's attention, since Tsuki had a similar encounter today, only it was the other way around. He had thought that he had found Hoshi-niichan. Instead, he had stopped someone who looked just like his niichan, a someone who went by the name of Yoh. So Tsuki excitedly suggested, "Maybe you saw Hoshi-niichan! Yoh-san looks awfully like him."

Anna's eyes narrowed. "This is the second time I've heard that name mentioned today. Who is he anyway?"

Anna's question hung in the air, unanswered, until the front door slid open.

The three in the room, along with Tsuki, turned to see who the newcomer was. The boy who stepped in immediately said, "I know who he is." The boy, dressed in a sleeveless red top and baggy black pants, slid the door close behind him.

"Ren!" exclaimed both Horo Horo and Yoh.

"How do you know who he is?" interrogated Anna.

Ren glowered. "I met him in the graveyard a few days ago. He looked exactly like Yoh...but with longer hair. He no longer has his Spirit of Fire with him, but he used the air molecules around him as the medium for his oversoul with his new spirit."

The eyes of the three in the room widened. Only Tsuki was left wondering what was going on. Spirit of Fire? Air molecules? Oversoul? Spirit? Tsuki was really, really lost.

Ren continued. "There is no doubt about his identity." He glanced at Yoh, who quietly whispered what was on everyone's mind except Tsuki's.

"Hao is back."

to be continued

translations
koropokkuru – the little people who live under those big leaves. Horo Horo's spirit is a koropokkuru.

Next chapter: phone call

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