29 September, 2006
Somewhere
Hope shifted a bit as she returned to the world of consciousness, but could not remember when she fell asleep.
'Why does the back of my head hurt so much?' she wondered before attempting to open her eyes.
"Oh, she's waking up!" an unfamiliar female voice cried out.
'Does she have to be that loud?' Hope thought. 'My head hurts enough as it is!' She figured she must have fallen out of her computer chair thus explaining why she was knocked unconscious, she must have hit her head hard enough.
"Damn computer," she mumbled while sitting up slowly. "Or chair….don't know which."
"Are you feeling alright deary?" the female from before questioned. Must be a friend of her little sister.
"I will be," she replied deciding to be polite instead of rude. However, when she opened her eyes she was met with quite an odd sight. Her eyes widened as she would have fallen backwards if she hadn't been sitting, instead she moved against the wall quickly realizing this was not her bedroom.
"Oh, I didn't mean to startle you!" the female said in an apologetic voice.
'Sky blue hair, pink eyes….holy hell!' This only caused her to back up further against the wall. 'I must have hit my head too hard, I'm still dreaming.'
"Don't be afraid," a smooth male voice cut in. Hope couldn't bring herself to look at the owner of the voice, maybe this was all just a dream. Yes, that had to be it. "We're only trying to help you." Of course, curiosity killed the cat. It didn't take a genius to figure out who the male with the long crimson hair and emerald green eyes was.
'Damn,' she thought. 'That's a deep red, didn't think that was humanly possible. Then again, sky blue isn't either.'
"I need to check you injury to make sure it's healing properly," he informed her.
"Injury?" she questioned with a quirked eyebrow. The only thing on her body that hurt was her head; she just hit it too hard is all.
"When my friend found you, you had a head wound." Hope reached up to touch her head only to feel bandages wrapped around her forehead. When had she injured herself? More like how? She let Kurama unwrap the old bandages, wincing when he applied the medicine to keep infection away.
'Can a dream hurt?' she wondered as he put new bandages around her head.
"Are you feeling alright deary?" Botan questioned.
"Yes," Hope replied.
"That's good, we were beginning to worry. You were unconscious for three days."
'Three days?' Hope thought with wide eyes. 'But I just…it's only….' She came to yet another realization. 'How can I understand them? I'm still learning Japanese and only know choice few words!'
"Is there anyone you'd like to call, to let them know you're all right?" Kurama asked. Hope numbly nodded knowing her mom and dad would be worried sick. After being handed the phone she dialed in the area code and number. She almost dropped the phone when the operator said that the number did not exist.
'This is the right number,' she thought. 'I know my number by heart, why does it not exist?' She tried dialing her mother's cell phone, but got the same result.
"Is everything all right?"
"Um, yes," she smiled. "They must not be home is all."
"They're probably out looking for you, I can take you home," Kurama offered. Hope panicked; she couldn't let him take her home because she had no home in Japan to go to!
"Uh, that's alright. You've already done so much for me, I can find my way. It's not too far from here," she said in a light tone trying to sound convincing. "Besides, you probably have better things to do."
"It's alright; there is nothing I need to attend to at the moment. Taking you home would be no trouble." Hope began to panic, what now?
"I'll come too," Botan said happily.
"Really, there's no need. I don't mean to be so much trouble."
"You're not," Kurama smiled. "Don't worry."
'How can I not worry when I'm trying to keep you from finding out I have no home here? How did I get here in the first place? The last thing I remember was the light from my computer.' She decided to push that into the back of her mind and deal with the problem at hand instead.
"I don't remember the street name! I just know what the area looks like, that's how I normally get home. I don't want to drag your around for thirty minutes trying to find something I recognize!" If she hoped that would deter them, she was quite wrong. Kurama was quickly becoming suspicious, the more excuses Hope made the more suspicious he became.
"You do have a home, don't you?" he asked.
"Yes! Of course!" she replied.
'Just not in this country,' she thought. Hope fought the urge to rub her head when it throbbed. 'What am I to do now? He suspects that I'm lying!' Botan shot Kurama a scolding look before turning back to Hope.
"Don't worry deary, we're not going out of our way. We'll make sure you get home safely!"
'Damn, why does it feel like this has happened before?' Hope couldn't help but wonder. She had an odd sense of Deja-vu going on.
She began to panic as his emerald gaze bore down on her prone form. What was she going to do? To say? She had no home, had no idea where her family was, and she didn't even know where she was for that matter! She definitely knew it was not the Makai, this place reeked of human.
"You don't have a home…"
"…do you?" Hope snapped back into the present as Kurama finished speaking.
"Ku-Shuichi!" Botan hissed. However, he didn't seem fazed. His gaze didn't move from Hope's nervous form. She wrung her hands in her lap as she wracked her brain for a logical lie. Somehow 'Of course I do' just didn't seem like it'd work.
"I…" Hope sighed, leaving her sentence unfinished. It was time to admit
…defeat. There was no way she could lie to him without being countered with yet another question, each getting harder to answer. She hung her head in defeat and sighed. "You're…"
"…right," Hope said at long last. She wasn't going to tell the truth at the moment, they would think she were insane or something.
"Why didn't you say so in the first place dear?" Botan asked.
"Because I didn't want to be a burden," Hope replied. She quickly thought up a back-story to use if need be.
Before another word could leave her mouth, blinding pain shot through her back. Her eyes widened and a scream burst forth from her lips unable to be contained. She could barely make out what Kurama said to her. All she knew next, was darkness once again.
'Why am I thinking of my story at a time like this?' she wondered while shaking her head. She didn't hear what Kurama asked her as blinding pain shot through her back.
"What is?" she groaned. "M-my story…" A scream erupted from her lips unable to be contained. "Is real?" She knew nothing more after that.
M.Y.T.R.A.G.I.C.L.O.V.E.S.T.O.R.Y
Tijiya: The words in italics are from Hope's story, it's like it's going through her mind.
Disclaimer Corner
Yu Yu Hakusho (c) Yoshihiro Togashi
Hope (c) Tijiya
