Chapter 3

PostedFebuary 8, 2006

Disclaimer; See Prologue

Hikari blinked as she heard the boy answer. He couldn't remember his name, or anything else? She looked at the boy; he was currently staring at Philippes-sensei with his dark eyes.

She tried to imagine what it would be like not to remember anything about her family. She shuddered mentally, to her, her family was what the most important thing; she would give anything for her family.

She awakened from her musing when she saw Philippes-sensei approach the boy with a serious look on his face.

"Can't remember? That's odd; you don't even have a concussion, or serious head injury for that matter. This is most curious; I'll run a few more tests to make sure we didn't miss anything the first time, because we saw nothing that could cause amnesia. Most peculiar…" Said the doctor, grabbing the clip-board at the foot of the bed that had most of the results from the few tests they had been able to run that day. They hadn't run many, just a body check for any surface injuries and other small stuff.

"Philippe-sensei. Is it possible that maybe he had a terrifying experience that forced his brain to lock-out the memories. He was found alone on the road." Suggested her mother.

"Hmm, that is possible, but then he would have only lost the memory of the incident, not his whole identity. Maybe we have a case of psychogenic amnesia?" Theorised the doctor.

"Psychogenic amnesia? What's that?" Asked a curious Hikari, she was familiar with many hospital-terms and many sicknesses from helping around in many different hospitals with her mother, but this was a new one to her.

"Psychogenic amnesia is when someone completely forgets their identity. They can't remember who they are, but they still retain all their abilities. They can still speak any language they've learned but they just won't remember how they learnt it." Explained the doctor as he put the clip-board back where it belonged.

"Oh." Hikari took a quick look at the boy and say him staring at the mortuary tablet that contained Shigure. Had he seen her spirit sneak himself inside it while they were talking? Could he see spirits? She was suddenly grateful that the cat that had adopted her was invisible at the moment.

"There's still the matter of a name though." Stated the doctor. "We can't keep calling him 'boy' and John Doe doesn't really seem to fit him."

"Philippe-sensei, didn't he have a necklace with a tag on it earlier? Maybe that's his name? Even if it isn't we could always call him that." Said Akiko, staring at doctor.

"True." Obliged the doctor. "But I think we should ask his opinion on the matter. What do you say? Shall we call you the name that's on the tag we found you with?" He turned and looked at the boy; Hikari saw that he was reluctant to remove his gaze from her tablet and looked blankly at the doctor.

"What's written on it?" Asked the boy seriously.

Akiko picked up the tag from where it lay on the table and looked at it for a bit.

"It says; Hiro. Odd, it's a Japanese name, but it's written in romanji." Said Akiko, as she handed it to the doctor.

"Hmm, that might explain for his slight accent." Though the doctor aloud the doctor, who handed the tags to Hikari, who inspected the tags closely. She looked up at the doctor when he made his last comment however.

"Accent?"

"Well, you might not be able to notice it because you have the same accent. Since he does, that means he might be Japanese, or at least speaks the language fluently enough to have an accent."

Hikari turned to look at the boy, who was looking at the tags with mild interest.

"Ne, what do you think? Should we call you Hiro?" Said Hikari, smiling as she put the tags around his neck.

She watched as he lifted the tag and stare at it. He then turned to look at her still smiling face and smiled.

"Sure."

When Hikari, her mother and little brother returned home later that evening, she went straight to her room. Placing her school bag at the foot of her bed and her spirits tablet on her desk, she took out the supplies for her daily meditation.

Once her incense burner was placed in front of her and she had placed her incense - she had chosen lilac scented because that was her favourite flower – and was lit, she sat down on her bed, crossed her legs and cleared her mine of all thoughts, focusing on only the glowing ember on the stick and the plume of smoke that arose from it.

Ever since she had been five years old she had meditated, or at least try to, every day. It was a sort of tradition within her family. The Yamato family was a very old family, whose roots could be traced back to when Japan had been known by Yamato and they were a very shamanic family, not as powerful as the Asakuras' but still powerful enough in their own right. But they might soon be though; mainly because the Asakura family was dwindling in numbers.

The Yamato family was pretty large, it was estimated that there were over sixty people. They weren't to sure because when the Asakura family had warned them that Hao had been born again, her grandfather had decided that until the Shaman Fights were over, they should spread out across the globe, so that in the event that Hao came to recruit at the Yamato compound all he would find was her grandparents and a few of the weaker members of her family and it would be nearly impossible for him to find all of the members.

Her, her mother and her brother had seen the comet that would hail the start of the tournament. Hikari hadn't participated in the competition, mainly because she didn't particularly like fighting, even though she knew she was strong by shaman standards. The other reason was that it had been decided that her cousin; Akane, the heir the Yamato clan would represent their family.

She had met him once, when her parents had gone the compound to show her new little brother to her grandparents. He had been there to receive 'special training' for the tournament. She hated him the moment she met him. He was too stuck-up in her opinion, spoiled rotten. She doubted he had made it past the prelims.

She took a deep breath and yawned as soon as the last of the ashes from the incense had fallen into the tray. She got up and placed the tray back where it belonged and looked at her watch.

Mom must be finished with supper by now, she thought. Just as she thought that she heard her mother calling.

"Hika-chan! Supper's ready!" Shouted her mother from the kitchen, she even heard her little brother shouting what she presumed to be the same thing. She wasn't to sure, seeing as he was still learning the finer parts of sentence structure. That and the fact that he tended to mix together his Japanese, English AND French into some new, bizarre language that they had yet to understand.

"Coming!" She shouted and made her way to the kitchen.

She entered the kitchen to find her mother fighting with Ken, trying to get him into his booster seat, not having much luck.

"Kaa-san? Need any help?" She asked her mother.

"Yes, please. Just set the table. Hopefully this won't take long." Said her mother, still struggling to put the toddler in his seat.

"Sure." With that, she set up the table for their small family and when she was done, she helped her mother bribe little Ken into his seat with a small piece of candy.

When that was done, they sat done and began to eat their supper in relative silence.

"Kaa-san, what do you think happened to Hiro-san?" Asked Hikari. "To, you know, make him lose his memories and stuff?"

Akiko put down her chop-sticks and sighed before looking at her daughter.

"I'm not to sure, Hika-chan. He had no serious injuries to his head, so the only other logical explanation would be that there was that something traumatic happened and his brain is just blocking the memories of the event."

"But why did he lose all of his memories, wouldn't he have just forgotten the event?"

"That's what should have happened; it's a most unusual case."

"What's going to happen to him now?" Said Hikari sadly, using her chopsticks to push her vegetables around her plate.

"Well, until his wounds are healed, he'll have to stay in the hospital, the doctors should let him out in a month or so. Then he'll most likely be placed in foster care if we haven't located his parents and he'll attend school. It's only September, so he should only have a little problem catching up to whatever grade he's put in."

"Oh, ok." Said Hikari after a while, picking up a piece of cauliflower and putting it in her mouth.

Akiko looked at her daughter, thought about the idea that had came to her earlier when she saw the interaction between Hiro-kun and her daughter.

"Hikari-chan, I have a favour to ask you." She said, putting down her chopsticks.

"Yes, Kaa-chan?"

"I was wondering. Since there are no children Hiro-kuns' age at the hospital, think maybe you could spend some time with him? It might do him some good to have someone his age to talk to. I'd really appreciate it."

Hikari didn't even have to think about it, she had been planning on doing it even if her mother hadn't asked her to.

"Sure."

Authors Notes; My God. I am SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO sorry, but I've been really busy these past few days! It's mostly because I got a job on Friday! Quite funny, actually, how I got it. I brought my CV in on Friday morning and was hired on the spot; my first shift was that night. I got a job at Tim Horton's, night shift, which is from 10 pm to 6 am and unfortunately, I do my best work between sundown and 2 am, so you can see my dilemma. You have no need to worry though, because this Thursday might be my last shift; I'm only just finished my training last night and this Thursday I'm doing my first solo (night shift is always solo) and it'll be a test as well. If I do well, I get the job, if not, I get paid for my time during the training and I look elsewhere. I'm not too crazy about the hours, so I hope it's the latter. I can always find a better job elsewhere that pays the same and in which I have better hours. I have no clue when I'm going to post next, so you'll just have to be patient until then.

Reviewer thanks;

I'd like to thank the following reviewers;

Khalia-chan, AndreaNefisto, isa18, Exploded Toilet Bowl. Thank you all!

PS; I know this chapter is boring, but I have to get through this tedious stuff first before I get to the good stuff. It's like how I used to eat my Halloween candy; eat the stuff I don't like first, then you get to use the better stuff to wash it down and you appreciate it all the more!