A.N: Hi, Tom is here with a new update!

First of all, thank you to everyone for reading and reviewing my other fics, it makes me really happy.

This is the first chapter of my new fic, but this time it's not a one-shot: it's a whole new story, with a brand-new plot.

The only thing I wanted to clarify are that I haven't read the Arcs 5, 6, 7 and 8 (I'm starting to follow the arc 9), but I know what happens in a nutshell, so maybe I'll miss some details here and there.

Of course, if that happens, you are free to respectfully tell me that I missed something.

I'll wait for Season 3 in order to improve my knowledge of the lore, but I'll try my best.

Other than that, soon I won't have a lot of time to write anymore, so don't expect constant updates (I know I said that even before, but I really wanted this chapter to come out)

As always, I've translated the whole thing with ChatGPT and then made corrections.

Enjoy!

Disclaimer: the characters of Re: Zero belong to Tappei Nagatsuki

After the shadow swallowed both him and Rem and Louis Arneb, Subaru was not at all sure what fate awaited them. It was likely that the Witch of Envy wanted to absorb him again, as in previous loops, which meant that he might had to commit suicide again.

However, when his body fell into the darkness, after seeing Emilia, Beatrice, and everyone else one last time, he didn't feel completely deprived of his life force, with the sensation of absorbing everyone's consciousness, as in the Sanctuary.

Realizing that things would be different this time, Subaru decided to wait before biting his tongue and starting over. Instead, their bodies floated, as if they had suddenly turned into gas, giving an almost pleasant feeling of lightness, but he still felt like he was being dragged along with Rem.

After a few seconds, they both felt themselves falling, but this time it wasn't Satella pulling them toward her; it was the force of gravity.

Immediately after, Subaru saw a purple oval, similar to a black hole, and behind it, a starry sky.

He would have liked to understand more about the surrounding environment, but when his body touched the ground, he hit his head harder than he would have liked. He immediately recognized the feeling that he was about to faint. It had happened to him so many times that he had lost count.

So he closed his eyes and quietly murmured, "Satella..." before losing consciousness.

On the other side of the portal, on the top floor of the Pleiades Watchtower, Emilia and the others were beginning to panic: since the moment those two had been swallowed by the shadow, Ram's synesthesia couldn't detect Rem's position, while Beatrice felt that her contract was intact but couldn't determine Subaru's condition or location.

This was clearly a problem, but before they could even think about the next move, the shadow disappeared, along with the possibility of following them.

Ram, clearly agitated, asked the question everyone was thinking: "What shall we do now...? Emilia-sama, what shall we do now?!"

In truth, not even the half-elf candidate knew: without a way to track them, they had no lead to follow. But it wasn't the time to give up.

Even though Emilia was worried about him, she still trusted her knight's abilities: "First of all, let's try not to panic. Beako, you said your contract hasn't been broken, right?"

Beatrice, who had remained silent but visibly shaken, nodded: "Exactly, I suppose. I feel that I'm still connected to him, but nothing more. That portal seemed to be a particularly powerful version of now, Subaru might even be in another dimension!"

"Even if that's the case, how could we help them now? I'm worried about Subaru too, Beako, but there's not much we can do. Let's first recover from the battle, okay? Then, once we've talked to Volcanica and returned from this place, we'll meet with the others to figure out what to do."

With these last words, which demonstrated Emilia's newfound maturity as a leader, the team resumed their tasks, much to Ram's surprise. Despite the conduct just shown, a part of Emilia was still quite distressed and feared for her knight's life.

Subaru, wherever you are, please try to stay safe with Rem...

The first thing Subaru saw was a blurred light, like a camera that needs to be turned on.

This light was very intense, but it was also somehow cold, unnatural. It reminded him of that time he exited the back of the Sanctuary, where he had been imprisoned by Garfiel. A memory definitely to forget.

When his eyes focused more, he saw a ceiling with a pattern of white square tiles, which didn't remind him at all of the Green Room.

Good, he hadn't returned by death. He could still save Rem.

When he tried to get up, his body trembled a lot, and Subaru felt extremely sore, so he decided to give up, but he noticed that his entire body was bandaged.

Even his neck hurt, so he decided to just stare at the ceiling and clear his head.

Now that he looked at it more closely, it reminded him of his home on Earth, and he felt a pang in his heart.

Then he heard a female voice, not too far from him, and after a few seconds, a face appeared before him that left him speechless.

She was a nurse, wearing a surgical mask, cap, and glasses. Everything seemed normal at first glance, but for Subaru, it couldn't have been more unexpected.

He had seen many doctors and medical assistants in Lugunica during the Battle of Pristella and the White Whale campaign, and he would have sworn on Otto's head that they didn't dress like this.

This attire wasn't from Lugunica.

...Could it be that...?

"He's breathing! Sir, he's breathing!"

"Really?! Move, Mitsuru!"

A new face appeared before the boy, replacing the nurse's, this time older. He had wide eyes and a lowered mask, showing both shock and a sort of euphoria in his face. "Boy, are you okay? For heaven's sake, someone call the family right away! God, I can't believe my eyes...you look just like him."

What...?

"...Excuse me, sir, could you tell me where I am and what is going on?"

"Boy, you've been missing from the face of the Earth for two years! You should be the one telling us what the hell happened to you and where you got all these injuries and fractures!"

"WHAT?"

The doctor's words gave new strength to Natsuki Subaru's body, and he immediately got up from the bed where he was lying.

There were several beds, identical to the one he was lying on.

On them, patients dressed in light blue gowns were being treated by other nurses assisted by medical machines, all of whom were looking at him with varying degrees of surprise on their faces.

There was no longer any doubt: he had ended up in a hospital, an Earth hospital.

Hey, why do I feel like my head is spinning again...?

And Natsuki Subaru lost consciousness again.

The first thing Subaru saw was a blurred light, very intense but also cold. Then, when the image became clearer, he saw a ceiling made of white square tiles, which he didn't remember—no, wait, he did remember this.

Damn! The hospital!

Once again, Natsuki Subaru's body shot up, but this time he was greeted very differently than before.

What he saw was an army of reporters and cameras, arranged in a semicircle, all staring at him.

Large cameras, microphones; he felt like the protagonist of a movie, with how much he was being observed.

The clicks and flashes disoriented him a lot, causing him to cover his face with a hand for a second.

Next to him was the same doctor from before, who was urging the reporters to take a step back.

Suddenly, a journalist, after shoving the doctor aside, pointed the microphone at him and asked: "Natsuki Subaru, would you give us a statement? How do you feel right now?"

Subaru, still completely stunned, tried to respond: "I-I-I...I-I'm...I've been...sent back...I-I...wuagh!" and burst into tears, covering his face with his hands, leaving everyone speechless, frozen like statues.

His body trembled like a leaf, and it felt as if he had shrunk as he recoiled.

...Why?

Why was he crying like a child? He didn't want to cry, he wanted anything but that.

He was ashamed to cry in front of his friends, let alone in front of an army of strangers pressuring him with questions.

But at that moment, Natsuki Subaru's heart could only conceive this response.

It wasn't the first time he had done interviews or met a journalist, and every time, he just had to put on a tough front and recite his script, but this time he couldn't. Because the feelings flooding his tormented heart were so many and so different, in many cases totally opposite to each other, like a calculator to which the same number is continuously added and subtracted, driving it crazy.

Pity, relief, sadness, joy, anger, euphoria, despair, peace, delirium, order, denial, acceptance, madness, realization...Natsuki Subaru's heart was constantly being destroyed and reshaped with every tear shed.

He didn't want to live this situation, where everyone would see him for the pathetic homunculus he was, he really didn't, but it was the only thing he could process.

The more he thought about the implications and the bad impression he was making, the more he cried, keeping him in an emotional vortex from which he thought he would never escape.

He had never let it all out like this, not even when Emilia gave him her lap as a pillow, not even with Beatrice; nothing comparable to ...this had ever happened to him.

He was crying so hard that his entire chest hurt, perhaps due to some broken bone, but he couldn't care less.

Usually, in moments like these, he and Beatrice would go to his room and talk, but this time he didn't have his Beako by his side and couldn't even move, leaving him at the mercy of the people pressuring him, leading to even greater despair.

He just wanted to disappear, to dissolve like mist, leaving no trace of himself.

He wanted to cease to exist, because otherwise, he believed this would be the time he would truly go insane, if it hadn't already happened.

What he felt couldn't even be expressed in words, as absurd and unbelievable as it was.

That little house of cards of his, during a storm, was his sanity, and when he didn't think the situation could get any worse, something else happened that drove his brain out of its mind.

At one point, a path opened up in the crowd of journalists, from which emerged... Natsuki Kenichi and Natsuki Naoko, who were out of breath, with sweaty foreheads and disheveled clothes.

Subaru hadn't even noticed them, too focused on wanting to erase his name from history, until they made their way to his bed and gently removed his hands from his face.

At that moment, the hero of Priestella opened his eyes and saw something he had deemed impossible, and cried even harder, hugging his parents as much as possible, who joined in Natsuki Subaru's desperate crying.

Their reaction was so strong, so powerful, that it even shook the doctors, other patients, and journalists, who first began to have teary eyes and then quietly cried, trying not to disturb the reunited family.

After spending half an hour unleashing his emotions, with no barrier holding him back, Subaru said softly, because he couldn't and didn't want to speak any louder: "...I don't want to say anything right now, can you please leave and let us be alone?"

Miraculously, everyone obeyed this request, leaving slowly, like a funeral procession.

As soon as everyone left, another doctor entered through the same door the others had exited, with comically large mustaches and a bald head.

"Hello, everyone. I am extremely sorry for the disturbance, but I must give you the medical report on how Subaru is doing," he said, handing Subaru his medical file.

"I promise to be as quick as possible. So, Subaru, compared to your last medical visit, done 3 years ago, you have much more developed muscle mass, which saved your physique from far worse fractures than those I'm about to reveal to you. In total, you have: a sprained left wrist, a microfracture on the nape of your neck that caused your cranial trauma, various lesions and cuts all over your body, particularly on your arms, almost all of which are healed and resemble animal bites, a sprained right ankle, and finally a broken rib and several fractures on your right ulna. Stuff fit for a prisoner of war.

Naturally, you will report all the details to the police, but could you tell me how you got all these fractures?"

The boy, with his eyes covered by his lowered bangs, said in a hoarse voice: "...I fell from a very high place."

"That's plausible, considering the passerby who rescued you found you in a pool of blood. However, this doesn't explain the other injuries. Do you want to talk about it? If you want, you can do it without your parents, since you're of age."

At this last remark, the doctor received dirty looks from Subaru's parents, but he didn't seem to mind. "...I'm not ready to talk right now. If you want, I'll tell you later, but not now."

At this response, the man in the lab coat gave a shy, understanding smile: "Of course, boy, that's perfectly understandable. It must have been really tough for you. Focus on your recovery, okay? For anything else, I'm Dr. Hashimoto, nice to meet you. I'll leave you in peace now."

With that, the doctor took Subaru's medical file and left, walking briskly for a man of his age.

But before he left the room, Subaru called him, because he remembered something: "Mr. Hashimoto-san, wait a moment!"

"Yes?"

"When you found me, I wasn't alone, right?"

"No, there was a girl with blue hair and a child with very long blonde hair with you. Do you know them?"

"Yes, they are really important people to me. Please, as soon as possible, can you tell me how they're doing?"

"There shouldn't be any problems with the child if you vouch for her. However, I can't say the same for the girl, who will need to give her consent before I can show you her medical report. Is that okay?"

Subaru, clearly disappointed, nodded affirmatively: "Yes...that's fine."

In a way, he had told the truth: he cared about both, but for completely different reasons. He wanted to keep an eye on Louis Arneb, who still represented a danger to him, while Rem, well, was Rem.

"Perfect, then if you don't need anything else, I'd like to leave the intensive care unit." – and he left. A few minutes passed, during which the three of them just stood still, without saying a word.

Sure, Subaru had infinitely missed his parents, but if there's one thing he hates, it's that silence he doesn't know how to break because it's in those moments that he becomes an open book.

"Hey, Dad..."

"Oh, my son, your voice is so different from the last time. I'm so happy to witness such a change...!"

"Yeah, Dad...you've both changed a lot too."

This comment was true: his absence had changed them a lot, but not in a positive way.

Kenichi still seemed to be in excellent shape, despite everything, but he had a few white strands of hair at his temples.

However, the most evident change for Subaru was in his mother Naoko: she still looked young and beautiful as she did back then, but the fairly noticeable bags under her eyes betrayed her.

If Subaru could have chosen, he would have rather had a kidney removed than see his mother looking so much like him in such a disgraceful way.

The last time he saw them was during Echidna's First trial, but he knew well, even though he tried not to think about it, that they would never be as radiant as they once were.

That being said, now that he was back home, he promised himself that he would restore the Natsuki family, no matter the cost.

And he decided to start right away.

"Hey, Mom..."

"Yes, dear, tell me."

"...Would you make me some mayonnaise to celebrate my return, when we go home?"

"...AHAHAHAHAHAH, of course, dear. We love you so much; we'll give you an entire pool of mayonnaise."

And so, the Natsuki family continued to chat and laugh, with the smile restored on a family that had been broken.

Meanwhile, Dr. Hashimoto was in his office, lost in thoughts.

Before Natsuki Subaru was found, it had been a very quiet day for the doctor, and he had finished his tasks for the day, but then things changed drastically.

Now that he had also dealt with that issue, he could return to his meditations, and oh, he had much to meditate on.

He still found it hard to believe: Natsuki Subaru had returned from who knows where after two years.

Two years ago, it was very difficult for anyone not to have heard about his story, which was objectively incredible.

A hikikomori boy, just a few months isolated, had gone shopping at a mini-market in the city center and had disappeared since then.

So far, nothing too strange, apart from the fact that the kidnapping had been successful practically in the city center, which was unlikely, according to the doctor.

The part that half the world had made millions of theories about was another: the last time Natsuki Subaru was seen alive was through the surveillance camera of the mini-market.

This camera had recorded him literally vanishing into thin air.

The boy was rubbing his eyes and, poof, gone, like in a magic trick.

The police checked dozens of times if the camera had been tampered with or something else, but nothing had happened: what the surveillance camera had recorded was integral.

Every news outlet talked about it, and the word spread quickly.

Of course, after a few hours, the parents, who he had finally had the honor to meet today, called the police, and searches started for two weeks, without any results.

At one point, they even organized volunteer teams to find him, but it was all in vain. They even used sniffer dogs to track him down, but they all stopped in front of the mini-market, without indicating a trail that the supposed kidnapper had used.

From that single video, hundreds of theories emerged: a runaway to change his life permanently, an alien abduction, a murder carefully orchestrated by his school bullies, a Reptilian or Illuminati conspiracy, secret service hackers; there was something for everyone.

In 2 years, no one had found anything more about him, while the parents, desperate, sometimes received interview requests from some vultures on some TV show to boost ratings.

And then, silence for two years.

And now, around 11 PM, he had returned exactly as he had left, but with someone else this time: a girl dressed in travel clothes and a girl estimated to be 12-13 years old, dressed in a single white dress that made her practically naked.

Subaru himself was dressed in strange clothes, presumably travel clothes, but they seemed terribly out of date. Furthermore, while he was covered in wounds, the girls didn't have a hair out of place.

What an absurd case... – the doctor thought.

Now he was waiting for the medical reports of the two girls to see if they also needed to be admitted to intensive care.

It was still possible that they had internal injuries, and he, as the department head, had to be sure, so for safety he ordered both an X-ray and an ultrasound for both.

Knock knock

Someone knocked on the door.

"Mr. Hashimoto, am I disturbing you?"

"No, no, please, come in."

A nurse entered the office.

"Here are the reports you requested."

"Thank you very much, you may go now."

"Goodbye, and see you tomorrow."

After handing over the files containing the reports, the nurse left.

Meanwhile, the doctor put on his reading glasses and began to flip through the first file...and a few minutes later, he began to frown.

What the hell...?

The girl with the blue hair seemed to suffer from total amnesia, but there were no signs of cranial trauma. Moreover, her leg muscles were completely atrophied, as if she hadn't moved for months, even years.

But the strangest part was that both exams reported that her bone and muscle structures had completely skewed values.

It made no sense: this girl had atrophied leg muscles, but if she ran, it would be at the level of an Olympic champion.

The doctor shook his head, as if trying to clear his thoughts, and moved on to the next file.

As he read line by line the report, his face took on an increasingly astonished expression, with his eyes widening more and more.

No, something was wrong here.

The girl with absurdly long blonde hair had no internal injuries, which was great, but her data was very similar to the girl with blue hair.

In short, he was faced with a 13-year-old girl who could knock out a professional boxer. And yet, despite this, her slim body was like that of a normal child, which simply wasn't possible.

The file, apart from this, contained nothing else, so he closed it and placed it on the desk.

Clearly, something was off.

The strangest thing to him was that while Natsuki Subaru's body was covered in wounds, the girls who were with him were practically unscathed.

Dr. Hashimoto lightly slapped his face as if to wake himself up and stood up. He was very tired; his shift was over, and he needed a cup of tea. He would mull over these events at home.

Just before reaching the door, however, a nurse opened it for him.

"Excuse me, Mr. Hashimoto, the girl has escaped!"

It seemed the day wasn't over yet.

Louis Arneb was running as fast as she could, dashing through the entire hospital floor, causing a bit of panic among the people, but she couldn't care less. She had to find… wait, what was his name?

She stopped for a moment to think about it, then shook her head and resumed running on all fours, like a dog.

This was not the time for such thoughts.

She had woken up a few minutes ago in a dress she didn't recognize, in a completely unfamiliar place, surrounded by people who were covering their faces.

But when she noticed that the person she needed so desperately was missing, she began to panic, and, after freeing herself with a kick from one of the people standing between her and that person, she ran off.

Luckily, they had a distinct scent; she would recognize it among thousands.

Now she just had to turn right and...

"You're...!"

There he was! The person she needed to protect! He was being attacked by two people!

"Mama! Papa! Get away from her!"

The two obeyed, but they didn't expect that the girl's target was Subaru himself.

When she saw him on the hospital bed, all covered in bandages, she quickly realized that he was alive, yes, but injured.

His tears were evident, and Louis would make those who made him cry pay dearly, very dearly.

So, she jumped on him, between his legs, careful not to step on him, and started growling at those present, especially Kenichi and Naoko.

Naoko, surprised but not scared, asked, "Subaru, who is this child?"

"She's very dangerous, you need to stay away from her!"

"Uh, are you sure? I mean, she's licking you now."

Naoko wasn't wrong: while they were talking, Louis was trying to lick the wounds covered by the bandages. However, while Subaru would have found such a scene at least funny, now he found it anything but amusing.

He still remembered what that girl was capable of, and he wanted nothing more than for her to get off him.

He tried to shake her off, a difficult task considering his position: "Come on, get off me right now!"

After a few seconds, the girl obeyed, but her expression filled with sadness.

Why was he angry with her? She was protecting him and only wanted his well-being.

When she got off, though, her attention was caught by the people next to him.

Who were they?

They had a scent similar to his, a similar appearance, and they addressed him as Subawu, without any malicious intent.

Well, if Subawu was the name of the person she cared so much about, though she couldn't remember why at the moment, then she would also call him Subawu.

She turned to him again: "Auu?"

"I think she's trying to tell you something."

Subaru frowned as he turned to her. "What do you want?"

In Louis's mind, what she wanted to convey with her words was concern for his health, something like "Are you okay?" but what came out was: "Auu, ae ouu eou?"

All clear, then, and so Subaru, despite wondering why she was making those animal-like sounds, decided to ignore her.

"Listen, I know it sounds absurd, but this girl is really dangerous and not at all who she seems. Try to stay as far away from her as possible, and I'll explain why later."

What should he do?

He wasn't in any condition to fight, but he had no intention of involving anyone at the risk of making that person lose their name and memories.

The first idea that came to mind was to call the police, but he had learned something in the other world that made him discard that idea immediately.

Perhaps against some thief, the police might have been helpful, but against a Sin Archbishop, there was little difference between a civilian and a guard.

He would rather take care of it himself, but in his current state, that wouldn't be possible.

But one thing Natsuki Subaru was sure of: if Louis Arneb even so much as touched his parents, he would send her to a hell worse than Return by Death.

While Subaru was steeling his hatred for the girl, his train of thought was interrupted by a voice he had heard before.

"Is everyone okay here?"

It was Dr. Hashimoto, along with a couple of his colleagues in lab coats.

"Oh, there she is. Meiko-san, Noriko-san, can you take the girl back to her bed while I talk with the patient?"

The two doctors nodded, but when they bent down to take her by the hand, Natsuki Subaru shouted: "No! Don't go near her!"

"Speaking of which, Subaru, can you give us some information about this girl? For example, who her parents are or where she lives?"

Now, these were questions that put Subaru in a difficult position.

What should he say?

He certainly couldn't say that this girl was a psycho with the power to eat someone's memories who lived in a completely different dimension from both Earth and the other world, but he found it hard to think of something else.

Think, think, Natsuki Subaru. Who is this girl?

His brain was trying to articulate some credible information based on the life he had lived here in Japan, but his thought process was like a washing machine with a brick thrown in.

"Her name is Louis. I don't know who her parents are, but I think her last name is Arneb, or something like that.

I know her because when I still went out, I used to see her at the park near my house."

He would have liked to come up with something better, that didn't delve into his past as a recluse, but this was the first acceptable result that came to him.

"Arneb? That doesn't sound like a Japanese last name."

"I don't know; I think she has foreign origins." (Well, technically, that wasn't a lie.)

The doctor didn't seem very convinced, but he shrugged: "Foreign, you say. Alright, then we'll try to contact this Arneb family. Thanks for everything, Subaru.

So, should we take her back to where she was or not?"

"We'd be happy to, Hashimoto-san, but this girl is incredibly strong, how is this even possible?"

The scene before the doctor seemed came straight out of a comedy: the two nurses were each pulling on one arm, yet she hadn't moved an inch and was staring at Subaru as if waiting for some kind of order.

The boy, far too exhausted to further question the incredible situation that had arisen, pleaded in an exasperated tone, massaging his forehead: "Please, can you do what they say? I'm begging you, go away."

At these words, the girl began to cry intensely but no longer resisted the nurses, who carried her out of the intensive care room in their arms.

Natsuki Kenichi, rubbing his chin, asked his son in a perplexed tone: "Are you sure you didn't go too hard on her? She just seems like a very strong little girl to me."

This last comment only made Subaru even more mentally exhausted.

God, there was still so much to sort out in his messed-up head...