When he was one, his mother always noticed how he liked to swat playfully at the air, giggling at the empty space above his cradle as his blue eyes sparkled with happiness.
She always worried about what this could mean, although she tried not to let it worry her too much. Young children tend to have imaginary friends before they grew put of it at a later age, right? This wouldn't escalate into something bad, or so she hoped.
Too bad hope wasn't feeling particularly helpful as of late.
0o0
When he was five, he often came running up to her crying about the dark shape in the corner of his room that would always leer at him at night, hissing.
She never saw anything when she went in to check, even when her little boy screamed in terror and pointed at some invisible monster.
She wanted to help him, to chase his fears away, but there was nothing she could have done against an invisible terror.
She brought him to a psychologist, but there was nothing the man could do. No matter what he tried, her son kept seeing the creatures. At home, at school, everywhere. Her son wasn't spared the torment.
She just didn't know what to do.
0o0
When he was seven, he got into his first fight. Some students had been picking on another student at the school, and her son had just... snapped. Violently, at that.
The bullies were currently in the hospital for broken bones.
She had no idea why her son was so strong. She hadn't even thought a seven year old had that kind of strength.
When she asked her son why he had beaten his classmates up, and not gone to a teacher for help, he had simply said,
"I saw them hurtin' Yuki."
The brown haired, glasses wearing student wasn't named Yuki.
0o0
When he was twelve, he didn't talk about the things he saw all that much anymore. Occasionally, he did make a passing remark about the strange bug like creatures he saw everywhere, sometimes drawing them out on paper for her.
Sometimes, she wonders if there is some truth in what her son sees.
0o0
When he was fourteen, he still gets into fights, coming home with scraped knuckles, bruises, and scratches.
He doesn't know why he has a feeling of déjà vu whenever his mother cleans his injuries and lectures him.
During brief moments, he doesn't see his mother cleaning his wounds, but a brown haired teenager with glasses doing so instead.
He's never his mother about this.
0o0
When he is fifteen, his school announced a student exchange programme with another school in Japan.
A really classy, stuck up, kind of school in his opinion.
Which, thanks to his astounding luck (Note the sarcasm), he so happens to end up as the lucky student who's picked to go, never mind the fact he's an American who has obviously never spoken Japanese a day in his life.
His school probably just wanted to get pawn him off to another school for a while, so they just messed with the lucky draw.
How is a lucky draw even a way to choose students for an exchange programme?
Surprisingly, Japanese was easy to learn how to speak. Once again, déjà vu smacks him in the face.
He often wonders what he did in a past life to offend some higher up being in the sky. Although if he did have a past life, he wondered what he was like then.
He swats away another one of those bug like creatures in frustration.
Meanwhile, in Japan, the Director of True Cross Academy laughs as the staff cheerily ignores him.
0o0
As he was about to board the plane to Japan, why did he feel so nostalgic?
He shrugs this off as he takes his seat and reads a travel guide about Japan.
He really wanted to visit the Kyoto Tower.
0o0
Three days later, Ray Owens found himself standing at the entrance hall of True Cross Academy, gaping at mere splendour of the place in an almost comedic fashion.
And a mere three seconds later, did Ray realise he had no idea where the Director's office was.
He could only groan as he trudged off to ask for directions.
0o0
Mephisto Pheles, or John Faust as he known in the academy, found coincidences hilarious.
Especially so when it involved the Okumura twins.
Which was why when he found out who had been chosen for the student exchange programme (Which he had created out of mere boredom since things were getting rather dull), he found it extremely hard to breathe through his mad laughter. Especially when he found out who was going to be teaching the class the student was going to be placed in.
Yukio Okumura was no doubt going to think Mephisto did this on purpose, even though he (for once) had no hand in the placement.
Ray Owens, Rin Okumura, it was almost laughable how the names had the same first letter, especially how identical the two students were.
Well, except for the fact that Rin Okumura was fifteen years dead.
Which was really a shame, since the eldest Okumura twin had been such a wonderful pawn in his games.
Although the sudden suicide of Rin Okumura did put a halt on Mephisto's game, it was rather amusing to see his Father's reaction.
For starters, Satan was not happy with students of the Cram school, although he did refrain from setting them on fire.
Of course, Mephisto couldn't blame his Father if he had actually set the students on fire. After all, they had just single handedly pushed Rin to his eventual suicide.
Which basically meant they had just indirectly murdered Satan's son, Yuri's son, but either way, Rin was already dead.
Although... Amaimon did mention how their Father looked a little happier a few days later, obviously pleased about something...
Mephisto grinned. It seems that this was going to be much more interesting than he had first anticipated.
How was this little game going to end, he wondered as he waited for one Ray Owens to arrive.
0o0
A thirty year old Yukio visits his brother's grave, sets the white lilies Shiemi had grown in her garden, and cries.
It was, after all, the fifteenth anniversary of his brother's death.
He just wants to see his brother one more time, just to speak to him once more.
"I'm sorry."
[A/N Hey guys! So, I actually intended to post this story after I finish my current main story, buuuut as you can see, this story was just calling my name until I got down and wrote the damn thing.
Anyway, I'm actually not particularly sure where exactly am I going to go with this, but my few ideas I have for this story are this:
1. Rin/Ray does not get his flames until later when some random shit goes down.
2. Rin/Ray might remember his past life.
3. Satan is not an evil bastard who plans on conquering Assiah, because honestly I don't like that version of him. I kinda like the fatherly Satan.
4. Rin/Ray will come across his old friends from Cram school, but how their reactions will vary... eh, I need some ideas for that.
5. Basically, this story will be more or less fluff, and drama. Maybe some action.
6. Yukio has the Kurikara, since he kept it even after Rin died. Rin's flames aren't all still there, just bit of it that stayed since Rin was reincarnated before they could dissipate completely.
Well, those are my ideas, but I still need more ideas!
Anyway, thanks for bothering to read up until this point, so cookies to you.
See you guys next time!
~ Gwntan12 ]