Chapter 15 - Visitor Nobody Expects (1)

When James woke up, he looked around stupidly. He looked like he was in the hospital as usual. But he hadn't recovered. Most of his newfound fragments of memories were from when he was a child. The more he thought about them, the clearer things became, but at some point the movie broke again.

[Hey! James, are you okay? You've been quiet since you woke up.]

James looked to his left and right. There was no one there. He spoke in a low tone:

"I saw it... I was there... again. The figure didn't even look at me."

After a short silence, Fox asked:

[Do you want to tell me?]

James looked around again and heard footsteps. He smiled.

"Maybe after we get out of here."

A short while later the door opened. The same doctor came in, as expected. James spoke complainingly:

"Are you the only one who takes care of this whole hospital?"

Doctor sighed:

"I'm the one who chose to take care of your special case."

Doctor typed something on his tablet. Immediately afterwards he spoke:

"Never mind that, has your memory improved?"

James looked at him. After Fox, he was perhaps the person who had helped him the most so far. As he weighed his options, he didn't think it would do any good not to tell him. So after a sigh, he spoke:

"A bad memory... I remembered a bad memory and some accompanying information."

Doctor pulled up a chair and sat down, tapping on his tablet. Immediately he looked at James and asked:

"What kind of moment are you talking about?"

James' face fell slightly. He took a deep breath before speaking. He spoke in an emotional tone:

"My mom and dad. They were fighting when I was little. It was a violent disagreement out of jealousy. Even though they tried not to let me feel it... Well, the walls weren't very thick."

Doctor stopped looking at the tablet and looked straight at James. He had a sad expression on his face.

"I understand... I know it's not nice to ask, but... Have you ever been abused?"

James was surprised, but then he smiled.

"No, no. Neither my parents are violent hu- vestals. They were just arguing. But the tone of their arguments was... not unlike a fight."

As Doctor breathed a sigh of relief, James continued:

"Anyway, what was I saying? Yes, they were arguing. When I was little, I think I was about six years old. I don't have a clear enough moment to remember it in detail, but I could hear them arguing again. I remembered it as if I was living it."

When he finished speaking, the doctor was silent for a while. After entering a few things on the tablet, he spoke:

"I see, but what happened after that? Did your parents divorce?"

James froze. He didn't know what to say as a thoughtful expression appeared on his face. He spoke hesitantly:

"I- I... I don't know. I don't remember."

With that, the doctor sighed:

"I understand. Don't worry, my hypothesis was correct since you started to remember. You had a short-term memory loss. My guess is that everything will be fine in a month."

James nodded his head in agreement.

"I see."

The doctor hesitated before saying anything. But then he stood up and put his hand on his shoulder:

"Don't worry. Even though I can't do anything for your memories, you can tell me if you need anything."

James was surprised for a moment. Then he nodded his head in agreement.

'He's probably over-emotional.'

Frankly, he thought Doctor had done more than he could do to help him. After all, who would provide a job and accommodation for a patient? James didn't think anyone would do such a charitable thing.

He smiled.

"Thanks, but you've already helped me enough."

Doctor laughed.

"Haha! I haven't done much."

With that, he walked away slightly and spoke:

"It's me who should say thank you, you're the one who advertises our restaurant, it's talked about by many people."

James kept his smile, but inwardly he was surprised. He hadn't expected his gesture to have such a big impact, but after a brief reflection he easily understood why. What he had said was not something that everyone could do. He had made a big deal out of it.

Everyone wants to be able to beat the best, but who would challenge a name like Spectra Phantom in such an environment? The answer was simple, a big nobody. Nobody would dare to do such a stupid thing. Because everyone would know their place.

Those who didn't would take a beating, and James was sure there were many who wanted to see the best take a beating.

James spoke with a smile:

"I'm true to my word, I'm going to keep beating Spectra until I'm ready to challenge him."

"I know, and that means I'll be seeing a lot more of you. It's imperative that we reserve a proper room for next time."

James laughed.

"That would be good, actually. I feel like someone's going to come through these curtains at any moment."

Doctor nodded in understanding and then spoke:

"We'll see about that the next time they come. Anyway, you can leave whenever you want. You don't have much anyway. Your body is in abnormally good shape, in fact. You don't seem to have hurt anything."

At that moment James remembered the little trick he had pulled when he had arrived here. His face took on a strange expression. Doctor told him that a girl had brought him in before he left, but then she had run off. As he waited to make sure she was well away, he heard a voice in his mind.

[I... I'm... I'm sorry. It's my fault you're reliving these moments again.]

Hearing Fox's sad voice, James' face took on a strange expression. She was right. If she realized his situation, she could have fixed it, he could have chosen to reincarnate in another universe, remembering everything, and not even deal with such an absurd situation in the first place.

James was aware of that, of course. Still, there was no point in blaming Fox at this point. It was equally pointless for her to keep blaming herself.

He spoke in an angry tone:

"Stop blaming yourself. Even though I'm in this situation, aren't you here to make things right? No matter how much you blame yourself, what's done is done."

Then he paused for a moment and added:

"And only I have the right to blame you in a situation like this, you Orihime Inoue. Stop blaming yourself."

Fox was stunned by her sudden all-out speech. He stammered involuntarily:

[Wh...What? Who is it? And you're even interfering with me blaming myself?]

James spoke without hesitation, naturally and as gruffly as before:

"Yes, I do, don't you like it? I'm the one suffering here, am I complaining to you? No, then you have no right to complain, foxy."

Fox responded in a surprised and yet uncomfortable voice:

[F-Foxy?]

James grinned and continued:

"Yes, foxy. Do you like it? Foxy, foxy."

Fox said in a tone that showed she was uncomfortable:

[Please stop it. This is so... weird.]

James then turned serious and said:

"So stop blaming yourself."

With that, Fox had thrown up the flag of surrender. In a defeated but uplifted voice, she turned the subject and asked:

[Okay, okay, I don't blame myself, so what are you going to do now?]

At this James paused. He looked left and right. When he was sure no one was there, he spoke:

"First I want to see what the silver module does."

He quickly clicked on the silver module in the system window and a new system window appeared in front of him.

<4>

<Scent of Blood>

<In Moment of Combat: All stats increase by 100.>

<0/5>

This time there was a tiger with red fur on the card. Its eyes glowed a deep crimson color. Apart from the eye detail, James thought the image looked largely like Pyrus Tigrerra from the first season.

Still, it was not a useful module. After closing the system window, he spoke:

"For now, we'll just wait for a while. In the best case Spectra Phantom's dog will come to measure me."

Of course James had made this prediction with an absurd amount of optimism and he knew it. Fox asked directly:

[What about the worst case scenario?]

James smiled.

"Nothing. We're stuck with what we expected."

Of course, that was too pessimistic. They both knew they didn't have the luxury of waiting.

[So what? You're just going to wait now?]

She asked in a confused voice. James smiled:

"Of course. For the next few days, I will only accept challenge requests from incoming opponents. Even though I won the last challenge, it was entirely due to the opponent's inability to manage both bakugan well. It had nothing to do with me."

After a pause, he spoke:

"So I'm going to stay on three hundred for a bit."

If James kept challenging his superiors like a rabid dog - and he was almost certain to lose the next one - sooner or later he was going to crash hard.

He had to stop for a while and accept those who sent him requests to battle. That way he could get more used to Bakugan battles and, with the experience he had gained, he would have no worries about challenging higher ground.

James's decision surprised Fox at first, but after some thought she understood the intention behind his thinking.