Special: Contacting the Continuum

"What? What's going on?" I protested as my wife half-dragged me into our family room where Ryu sat messing with a couple of toys in his play yard. I had just gotten home from a rough practice and my muscles still ached; even though it had been a while since the last training camp my muscles were still demanding R&R.

"Just shut up and sit down," she ordered as she gently but insistently pushed me onto the couch; on the table in front of me was some kind of ball. It looked like it was made of gold, and I could almost see my reflection in it.

"What's this?" I asked as I reached for the thing. "Did I win some kind of golden basketball trophy or something?"

"ACK! Don't touch it!" she yelled as she slapped at my hands, then sighed as Ryu started crying. "Just…don't touch it," she said as she picked up our boy and put him over her shoulder and started patting his back. "I'll show you what it is as soon as I get him calmed down."

"Next time, try not yelling," I suggested with a smirk as I leaned back on the couch.

"Next time try not touching something you don't know anything about, you musclehead," she countered as she lightly bounced our son in her arms.

"Fair enough," I chuckled. "Sorry about that."

After getting Ryu calmed and making happy noises in his play yard she joined me on the couch. "First off, this isn't a golden basketball, but I get why you'd think so. This actually belongs to Kotomi but she gave it to me because…well, you'll see."

"Ooooookay…"

I watched as she turned the ball a little, and I noticed a small, blinking red light on it. "This means we received a message."

"A message?" My question was more of a statement than anything. "This doesn't look like any answering machine I've ever seen."

"Just…watch."

Kyou pressed a button somewhere on the thing, and I nearly fell out of my seat as I heard a very familiar voice come from the ball: "Hey Tomoya… This is Tomoya."

"What the-?" my gaze snapped to my wife, who simply gave me a smile.

"Things were kinda busy while you were at training camp…" she started, and I had a feeling that I was about to hear something unbelievable.

End Special – read Mark629's 'The Kotomi Continuum III' for context.