The Forgotten

Chapter One

A/N: In case you still haven't noticed, the first page (the profiles page) has been changed a little bit, but in a major way, so first edition readers should read the second edition over and notice the changes. And I just remembered one more change to make, but I don't want to have to do all that stuff to change one little thing so yeah, I'll just post the change over here. I decided to set them as high school freshmen instead of middle school eighth graders (don't have a name for the school). Second very, very important change I haven't made is that since the shamans don't know they are shamans, they can't possibly have their spirit guardians wait for them in their dormitories, so the spirits are hanging out who-knows-where. Maybe if enough mistakes and changes rack up, I'll make a change.

A/N #2: It feels good to start a Microsoft Word document and not have to write the heading on the top. hehehehe

Disclaimer: dun own shaman king and most of the sources where I took the ideas and yada yada yada,

A/N #3: By the way, I'm starting the story with Manta already knowing that his friends had forgotten each other. I don't want to write nor think up of how he figured out that they forgot everything.

It was the first day of high school and they were freshmen. Manta trudged to school with the dictionary under his arm. He hated how new people would stare at him because he was so short, and this time, he didn't have Yoh or any of his friends to defend him because somehow, one day during the summer, they had all forgotten everything. He had already given up hope of having this nightmare reversed. Every night, he prayed that whoever's evil joke this was, would be set right.

Manta did NOT want to come to school today, especially a new school with lots of new people to stare at his midgetness. He was coming to the school parking lot. He walked past the office and the crowds of excited people who were excited to meet their friends and talking and talking and talking and talking and, you get the point. He stood by the classroom of his first period class, History, and waited there miserably.

Pretty soon, he saw Pirika and Horohoro walking toward him. His face brightened, but darkened again when he realized that they didn't know him. Pirika took no notice of him and Horohoro snorted with mirth into his sleeve and muttered "Super midget." Manta turned away sadly and saw Lyserg sitting against the wall reading a SAT prep book. Since when was Lyserg a geek? thought Manta. He saw more people he recognized, and somehow, they were all in his class, but none of them gave him so much of a glance, except for the curious glances at his shortness. Manta sighed. This was going to be a long day.

Yoh found himself popular. He had many, many friends and admirers and girlfriends and girl friends (note the space). Because he had so many friends, it was hard for him to go anywhere without huge gaggles of people following him or talking to him. Not that he cared. He was popular and he liked being popular. The warning bell rang and everybody scurried to their classrooms. Yoh smiled. He had enough time, five minutes. Anyways, he was going to arrive fashionably late on the first day of school. Today was a wonderful day! He was popular, he already had someone have a crush on him, he so many cool friends, and he liked it.

Manta sat, depressed, in his seat. The history teacher had already put up a seating chart and they had to sit in assigned seats. Many people groaned because they wouldn't be able to sit next to their friends, but Manta liked it that way. Then, he wouldn't have to sit shame-faced in a corner by himself. Lyserg sat to the left of him while Pirika sat to his right. Some random guy Manta didn't know sat behind him, while Hao sat in front. Manta looked around. He didn't see Yoh anywhere. That was funny, Hao was here, so how come Yoh wasn't? The late bell was going to ring soon. Manta looked all around the room (which was pretty hard since he was so short and couldn't see over the heads of a lot of people). He saw Ren sitting in a corner staring at directly ahead, and Horohoro sitting under his desk trying to die and Anna with all of her notebooks on her desk already. Tamao was sitting two seats in front of Hao with a pile of cute stationary. But where was Yoh?

The late bell rang. Where was Yoh? The teacher picked up a clipboard and started talking about welcoming the people to high school and blah blah blah, been there done that, thought Manta. He didn't hear what the teacher was saying as he looked around again. Maybe he missed Yoh, no he didn't, he had scanned the whole class thoroughly. The teacher was introducing someone, the classroom aide. Teachers these days are too lazy to do a lot of stuff themselves and get kids to do stuff for them. They're just kids, so they can't do the stuff as well as the teachers do it anyways, and being a teacher's aide gives some kids another elective, so it's a win-win situation for the teachers, Manta thought disgustedly. The teacher kept talking on and on in a monotonous voice. Manta took a look at the aide, and bolted upright. It was Jun, Ren's sister!

The teacher was taking roll now.

"Hao Asakura," said the teacher, yawning.

"Here," said Hao in a more bored tone of voice.

"Yoh Asakura." Silence. He repeated it. Silence again. "Hao, where is Yoh?"

"Dunno," he said, yawning widely, causing many other people to yawn.

"I'll mark him absent," said the teacher, yawning from Hao's yawn. So he isn't here after all, though Manta, but where could he be? Even though Yoh wasn't his friend anymore, Manta still wanted to know where he was. Manta yawned, he was sleepy. The teacher's voice droned on as he announced the names of the other people. Somehow, he perked up each time when hearing the names of his old friends.

"Lyserg Diethel."

"Present!" shouted Lyserg, saluting, causing many people to giggle. Manta yawned and put his head down again, only to perk up again at "Anna Kyouyama" A/N: there are sooooo many ways to spell Anna's last name. Okay, back to the story.

"Manta Oyamada."

"Wha…?" said Manta, after a long spell of putting-head-on-desk-and-yawning, "Oh, here!" Several people snickered.

"Pay attention," said Hao. Manta sniffed and went back to being sleepy.

"Tamao Tamamura."

"Here," she said like a normal person.

"Horohoro Usui."

"Present!" shouted Horohoro and saluted, mocking Lyserg. Most of the people laughed and the teacher spent a few minutes calming down the class.

"Pirika Usui."

"Here," she said in a sycophantic voice, swinging her hair. The teacher finished the attendance after a few more names and asked for volunteers to take the roll sheet down to the office. Nobody raised their hand. Suddenly, the door was kicked open, and Yoh Asakura walked in. Manta let out an involuntary gasp.

A/N: ok, lame cliffhanger and a pretty lame story. I promise the next stories will be much longer and be much better, but the beginnings (or exposition, I just learned that today at school, lol) of stories are always really boring, so that's okay. Please review!