I wanted to be useful, to bring satisfaction to Kyoya, to show that I’m not that helpless girl he took in. I am worth something to him.

But he just continued to show up, barging into my life, his music filling my ears with each surprise pop up visit. He was always there. He was always happy.

He remembered my name. No one has ever remembered my name.

Everything about him, from his dance moves to his banana hair (seriously what is that even supposed to mean?) he was different and he was confident and I hated every minute that he was there.

And yet, I felt safe with him. He was special to me, for some reason. His words, as cliche as they were, spoke to me in ways that Kyoya’s never have.

Kyoya’s words, while in tone were gentle, were only orders at the end of the day. While Tetsuya’s, were genuine to the end, and were filled with heart and love, compassion and understanding.

He wanted to know who Terumi Kuchinowa was, for as long as that girl has existed. I wanted to show him who ‘she’ was and learn more about ‘her’ together, right alongside him. I believed, that together with him, we could even figure out who I was before I became ‘Terumi Kuchinowa’.

But I can’t help but wonder if the girl I was before was weaker than the me of the present. Was she shy, quiet, submissive? Or was she brash, confident, intelligent and calm? I always fear for the answer, and yet the curiosity strives me towards that answer, towards clues of who I was before.

I hate to admit it, but it can’t be helped, as it was all true.

But he saved me; not from Kyoya, but rather from myself. I owe him my life, and my past life.

“Watcha thinkin’ bout Terumi?”

His voice, gentle and calm, like the early evening breeze caught my attention and I turned to face him. He still had that same annoying grin on his face, that made his cheeks pink and his colgate smile shine. I couldn’t help but look away and focus my gaze on the bleeding pink sky ahead of me, the clouds shrinking away and the stars were just beginning to peek through.

“Things. Just things, you know?” I reply.

“I get what you mean.” Tetsuya says. “I always have a lot on my mind, so sometimes you just gotta let ‘em flow.”

I nod. “Yeah, something like that.”

The me who isn’t me is waiting for me to find her. I know that I can do it now. It’s become a top priority for me now. No more Disaster. No more Kyoya. Just me! Whoever I am, the girl that isn’t Terumi Kuchinowa, but also in a way is her. We are the same, and yet completely different.

Occasionally Tetsuya sees her, walking down the road, playing in the park, eating takeout on a bench.  The first few times, he tried to run to her, to try and talk with her, get any sort of reaction out of her that would mean that maybe she was regaining her memories.  Every single time, she ran away when he got too close.  She hadn’t even seen him, just ran off because she was happy and free and able to do whatever she wanted now. 

And that was supposed to be good, wasn’t it?

He still tries, but she’s in middle school at Aibo Academy and he’s still in the elementary division, so they don’t have any shared classes and their classrooms are in different buildings so he can never catch up to her at school, no matter how much he searches.  Eventually he realizes (Kuguru suggests) she just doesn’t even go to Aibo Academy anymore, since her memory’s been wiped she wouldn’t remember school or to attend it, plus there weren’t any records on her in the first place.  He realizes that when he and Gao go searching through the student council office records (when Shido president is out) and find nothing on Terumi Kuchinawa or any other student with a photo that matched hers.  The only other orange-haired girls in the school were both in second grade.

That doesn’t stop him, and when Asmodai isn’t busy he even helps out, finding out if she’s doing okay or if anything bad has happened.  There was one scary moment when Tetsuya found out she didn’t even have a home anymore, so he and Asmodai had gotten an apartment rented for her near the school with some of Asmodai’s TV show money.  Otherwise, things had been pretty good.

One day, he’s dancing in the park when Asmodai appears and tells him she’s started buddyfighting again.

Tetsuya runs to Card Castle as fast as he can, and when he gets tired halfway through Asmodai reminds him he has a buddy skill.  He flies the rest of the way as fast as he can, nearly crashing into a lamp post.  When he finally reaches the store he nearly falls in through a window.

“Terumi!!”  He yells as he runs in through the store.  Nobody responds.  Some people look at him strangely though.

“That’s not even her name anymore.  She won’t remember it or respond to it.”  Asmodai says from beside him, and Tetsuya feels silly for forgetting that.  Some people begin noticing them, and a few kids begin crowding around Asmodai asking for signatures.  Tetsuya sneaks away while his buddy distracts them all.

That doesn’t change how Card Castle is huge.  There isn’t even anything saying that she’s still here.  But he’s got his heart.  It’s like the last time he really talked with her, their last buddyfight.  That feeling that something good could happen as long as he followed it was there then, and he was pretty sure it was here now.

“Oh!  Tetsuya!”  The Castle Store Manager waves at him as he approaches.  “What are you doing here today?”

“Just…” Tetsuya isn’t sure how to word it.  “Here to hang out yo!”

“I see!  Well, have fun.”  The manager says, putting down a few boxes on one of the checkout counters and rummaging through them.  “There are lots of kids that are starting Buddyfight because of the Gaen Cup!  I can’t wait to see how they’ll do!”

“Yeah!”  This was one of the most popular places to get Buddyfight cards in the city.  Any beginner would come here to get a trial deck or booster packs.  That meant that maybe…  Just maybe…

“Hey, Manager.”  Tetsuya says.  “Were there any orange-haired girls that started Buddyfight recently?”

The manager picked out a few booster boxes, then turned to him.  “Orange-haired girls?”

“Any around my age?”

“Uh…” Every second the manager didn’t ask felt like forever, and Tetsuya can feel himself jumping from foot to foot waiting.  “Oh yeah.  There’s this girl upstairs looking through the selection of worlds.  She said the game looked fun so she wanted to try it.  She was sort of ‘out of it’ though.  It was like she had never seen a store before.”

That had to be it.  “Thanks, Manager!”  Tetsuya yells, bolting for the elevator.  It’s in use, so he yells for Asmodai and activates his buddy skill, flying up and flipping onto the second floor.  He spots orange hair, and runs over to where he saw it.  A few people get pushed aside in the process, but he doesn’t have time to focus on that right now, not when he’s nearly─

She turns to look at him just in time as he trips over someone’s foot and lands face-first on the ground.  “Um… Are you alright?”  She says quietly.

Tetsuya bounces up and dusts off his pants.  “Just fine yo!”  He smiles, and with those words she smiled too, and it’s nice since it distracts him from the pain in his nose right now.  She laughs, and Tetsuya’s not sure what she’s laughing at, but she looks really, really happy and carefree so he laughs along too.  It had been months since he last saw her up close, at their last buddyfight which had been wiped from her memory.

“Um…”  She says, her laughter dying down.  “Your… hair?  It’s a bit… smushed…”

Tetsuya reaches up, and feels one of his bananas on the right side of his head bent and crushed, and cries out.  “Ah!  No!  My banana!”  He picks it off his head and holds it in his hand as if it was a carcass of his own offspring.  Now that he thinks about it, it sort of is.  He cries a bit over its loss.  Now he knows what she was laughing about.

“So, are those…” She points at the remaining three bananas growing on his head, “really….bananas?”

“Huh?”  Tetsuya reaches up and picks off a banana from the opposite side.  “Yeah!  Here!”  He holds out the fruit towards her.  “They’re really tasty yo!”

“But… your hairstyle…”

“It’s okay!  They’ll grow back!”

She still seems hesitant, but takes the banana and takes a bite out of it slowly, her face turning into an expression of surprise, and then happiness.  “It’s good.”

“It is!”  Tetsuya peels his own half-crushed banana and eats it happily. 

When she finishes hers, and he does too, they both throw the empty peels into a trash can nearby, and returns to the display of the different worlds of Buddyfight.  “You mentioned buddyfights last time I saw you.”  She says happily, without any idea how crushed he had been at their last meeting.  “I didn’t know what they were back then, but I’ve seen a few now.  They seem interesting!  Are you a buddyfighter?”

“Yeah.”  Tetsuya nods.  “It’s a fun game where you can become friends with whoever you play with!”

“It sounds great too!”  She turned back to the display of the different worlds, and looked at each one carefully.  “Although it also seems a bit complicated too.  Every buddyfighter fights for a world, and a buddy.  I wonder which world would work for me…”

“Legend World.”  Tetsuya says without thinking.  She looks at him in surprise.

“Is that your world?”

“No, it’s not that.”  He really hadn’t thought about what he was saying.  “I fight for Magic World!  I just think Legend World would suit you.”

“Legend World…” She said, looking at the display of the world.  Tetsuya could see some Heroes, some Wydar Sarkal, some Asgard monsters, and the so-familiar-it-hurt Olympus monsters.  There were the three Gorgon Sisters models at the front of the Olympus display, and she was staring at them in so much wonder.

“Do you… remember them?”

She looks up at him.  “No.  It’s just as I said.  I’ve never buddyfighted before, plus I just wanted to start because I saw an interesting match the other day.  I think both fighters were using dragons though.  I didn’t think they’d have such variety in what cards you could use!”

Nothing.  She didn’t seem to recognize it at all, just looked at it in interest.  He should have figured it wouldn’t be this easy.

“Okay then!”

Tetsuya looks at her again, where she was looking at the three Olympus monsters happily.  “I think I’ll go with these monsters!”

“Why?”  Tetsuya asks, without thinking again.

“Hmm…”  She studies the three, poking Gorgon Three Sisters Medusa a bit.  “I feel like… It’s nice.  Having sisters.  Having a family.  Having friends.  That must be something really nice!  Having someone so close to you that they definitely won’t forget about you.”

“It is.”  Tetsuya says.  “The monsters you fight beside in Buddyfight are your friends too.  And the people you fight against become your friends too.”

She nods, looking at the Medusa figurine again.  She was looking at so much, maybe, if Tetsuya could keep doing this for her, it could work.  “Hey, let’s get some booster packs!  Maybe we can get some good Legend World cards and build a deck for you yo!  But, do you have any money for them?”

“I have some leftover money from last week!  Every week a package shows up with enough money for me to live, plus some extra for whatever I want or need.  It doesn’t have any sender address or name, but I guess its fine.  It means someone remembers me.  Someone cares for me.”

She was using the money wisely, and that makes Tetsuya smile.  She was doing alright. 

“Hey, if you come back tomorrow I could ask my friend Baku to come here and help you build a deck!  He’s an amazing deckbuilder yo!”

“Nah, it’s alright.”  They walk over to the shelves lined with booster boxes, and she takes a few.  “I want to build my first deck all by myself!  My own deck!”  She holds the boxes out happily.  “I wonder what cards I’m going to get!”

She’s different.  Tetsuya wonders if this is what she was really like, before Dark Cores and Disaster Force.  Could she have actually been this happy before?  Did she really have to lose her memories to find happiness and freedom?

“Alright!”  She handed the Castle Store Manager some money and hugged the boxes as she skipped back over to him.  “Hey, can you come here tomorrow?  So we can have a buddyfight?”

Tetsuya smiles, and actually jumps into the air when he hears the words.  “Sure!  I’ll be waiting all day!”

“Two o’clock here would be fine!”  She laughs.

“Oh yeah, I forgot to introduce myself.  I’m Tetsuya Kurodake yo!”

“Nice to meet you, Tetsuya!  Then I’ll see you tomorrow!”  She shouts happily, waving wildly at him as she begins to run out of the store, still hugging those booster boxes.  That’s when Tetsuya realizes he forgot to get an answer to the question from months ago again.

“Wait!  What’s your name─” Tetsuya yells, but she’s already out of sight.  Again.  Asmodai reappears beside him, looking tired but curious.

“So,” Asmodai asks, “How’d it go?”

“I still don’t know her name…”  Tetsuya says.  He smiles at his buddy monster.  “But she knows mine now!  It’s something!”

He still had no ideas on how to get back her memories.  But he and Asmodai had made a promise, and he fully intended to keep it.