When I awoke again, I felt like I was someone else entirely. The faces I saw were not faces I knew, and the surroundings didn't look familiar either. The ceiling was white as snow and the smell of the room smelled wrong. I sat up quickly and looked around. Next to me on my right sat a woman with blonde hair and to my left side was an older woman with white hair who was sitting in a weird metal object... Was it a wheelchair?
"Arthur, are you alright?" the unfamiliar blonde woman asked, "We've been waiting for you to wake up."
"My name, how do you know of this?" I asked, even my voice wasn't the same. It sounded like a boy's voice who was in the middle of puberty, cracks in it and everything. I had been done with puberty a long time ago, so I barely remembered my own.
"I'm your Mother, silly," she said, "Why wouldn't I know your name?"
"Are you sure he's even our Arthur?" the white haired woman asked. The blonde who called herself my Mother looked takenaback, like the other woman had two heads.
"How could he not be?" The one claiming to be my Mother asked, "He was only asleep for a few hours after bumping his head."
"I don't know if I trust this hospital to care for my grandson," the white haired woman said, "Look at his eyes, they simply don't have the same look as our Arthur. Are you really Arthur Brown?"
"Aye, madame," I said, "I am Arthur Brown. I am where?"
"You're in the hospital," the white haired woman said, "You fell down the stairs the day after you and your mother moved into my home. I told Elizabeth not to move in with you, because the stairs were dangerous, but she didn't listen. She wanted to care for me in my own house. I told her she was crazy, because the stairs have always been wonky and much too steep. I was lucky that I have a room downstairs, but that forced you and her to move upstairs when you moved in. I did ask her to not put me in a home, but I also didn't ask her to move in with me. I would've been just fine if I moved in with you two at your old house."
"Mother, you know that we needed to move due to Arron's job," the woman claiming to be my Mother said, "He said that you agreed to have us move in after he explained the circumstances."
"That son of mine is no good," the white haired woman said, "If he just had a normal desk job this would've gone much more smoothly, but he decided to go into some sort of job where he's never home. It's terrible for raising kids, I tell you."
"Desk job?" I asked, "Why would one sit at a desk all day if there was a quest to complete?" The two women looked at me, then at each other, then back at me.
"You sound just like your father, Arthur!" Both of them shouted in unison. They looked back at each other and smiled. I didn't understand if I said something wrong or not. My body felt uncomfortable, but it might've been due to it not being mine.
"I do not understand," I said, "Something doesn't feel right."
"I'll go call the nurse," the one claiming to be my Mother said, "We can leave the room if you need us to."
"A nurse?" I asked, "Is that like a healer?"
"I guess you can say that," the one claiming to be my Mother said, "I'll be right back." She left, now it was just me and the white haired woman.
"You look a little frazzled, Arthur," the white haired woman said, "You also don't seem like yourself. Are you okay?"
"I don't know what I should be expecting," I said. The woman claiming to be my Mother came back into the room.
"The nurse in charge of Arthur said that he'll be a few more minutes," she said, "And that since Arthur is awake now, the doctor can do another examination on him. Hopefully we can take him home today if everything goes well. The school year doesn't start until next week, but I hope that he can go back to school on time. It is a new school, so if he doesn't come on the first day, things might not be as bright as we hoped they would be with this new start."
"He fell down the stairs and got a concussion, Elizabeth," the white haired woman said, "That ship has already sailed. You won't have the new start you hoped for, but it can always get better later."
"That's all I can hope for at the moment," Elizabeth said, she looked over at a clock. "Mother, do you want to go get some lunch? Patrick said that he and Dr. Lang will be right in."
"I am a bit hungry," the white haired woman said, "We'll be right down the hall if you need us, Arthur." Elizabeth grabbed the handles of the metal contraption that the white haired woman was sitting on. I was right, it was a wheelchair. They left me alone, the silence felt like it was an eternity, but I knew that it was only a few minutes. This new body seemed to make my sense of time go haywire.
A man in peculiar clothing entered the room. He came up to me with a smile.
"My name is Patrick," he said, "I'm your nurse today. I just have some questions that I have to ask you, Arthur. Can you tell me your name and birthdate?" Such an odd question.
"Arthur Brown," I said, "My birthday is January 1st year 0 of the Era of the Hero."
"I'm sorry, Arthur," Patrick said, "The name, month and day are correct, but the year is wrong. Can you try again?"
"What other year could it be?" I asked, "Unless you mean the actual year... But I'm just an old man, how am I to remember such things? The calendar changed with my birth, shouldn't it be obvious who I am?" Patrick smiled awkwardly.
"You're in the children's ward, Arthur," Patrick said, "Also, you're 15. Please, just try again."
"That cannot be," I said, "Why would I be a teenager again? What year is this? What planet is this?"
"It's 2011, Arthur," Patrick said, in an odd tone, like he was trying to humor me and thought that I was delusional, "And this is Earth."
"Neither of those make any sense to me," I said, "I know no Earth, and no known calendar has ever surpassed 2000." Patrick's face fell, like he had heard something oddly disturbing.
"I'll go let your doctor know that you're awake," Patrick said as he left in a huff. A woman in a white coat entered not long after Patrick left.
"My name is Dr. Lang," the woman in the white coat said, "I just need to ask some questions and do some tests."
"Your healer..." I said, "I meant nurse, left in a hurry. Did he eat something wrong?"
"Don't mind him," Dr. Lang said, "I want to hear about you, Arthur. Can you tell me the last thing you remember before you woke up here in the hospital?"
"I was drowning," I said, "I never drown."
"Your chart says that you fell down a flight of stairs and hit your head at the bottom," Dr. Lang said, "Can you tell me anything else that you remember about yourself?"
"I was a hero that was prophesized before I was even born," I said, "I lived 2000 years and saved the world 1700 times. I was born at the beginning of a new era and my life's work never felt complete. I feel like I died in vain. But to be told that I am now a teenager all over again. What treachery is this?"
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