Memory Cave

[voidtreckermods]

After the passengers see a glimpse of a life that is not their own they appear in a cave. It is light, a strange moss glowing on the walls and ceiling illuminates the cave nicely and it is large enough for them to pace around in without trouble.

They are not alone. In the cave with them is another voidtrecker. Maybe someone they know well, maybe someone they have only seen in the aisles of the train. But they are together in this cave together.

The cave has no exit, at least not yet. They know that it will, eventually. When the time is right.

But for that time to come, they first must talk...

(OOC: For reference: memories!)

Comments

[longforgottenpromise]

"I'm glad." He smiles at her, "I'm glad you have such good friends."

He hadn't known Roxas, in the small amount of time he had been on the train. But he knew Lea, not well but... He seemed nice.

There's still a lot of information echoing around his mind, all the things he heard and learned. But he doesn't question her, doesn't want to pry more than he has.

[nobodys_puppet]

She gave a small nod, not knowing what else to say.

[longforgottenpromise]

He fell silent, looking down at his hands, unsure of how to help her further.

"Um... Sorry... Do you have any more questions?"

After all, they were in this cave, it's not like there is much more for them to do but talk.

[nobodys_puppet]

"What is a car tune? He said it had nothing to do with cars, and I should watch them," the he being Crowley this time, though she didn't realize she needed to clarify that she had jumped people. "But I thought tunes had to do with music? And Axel said that he was probably making sun of me, which meant he expected to be laughing but that I wouldn't also find it funny, but that it is hard to tell when someone is sharing a joke or making fun of you. I thought fun was supposed to be good...?"

[longforgottenpromise]

"Car tunes..." Nothing to do with cars... Should watch them. He's a little bit confused, struggling to follow her thread of conversation but he nodded.

"A cartoon?" Because that was something you could watch and had nothing to do with cars.

"Um. They are drawings. But they move, it's just pretend but... It is a way of telling stories. They have nothing to do with cars or music really. Have you been in the cinema car on the train?"

[nobodys_puppet]

"Drawings that... move?" she was so confused.

She shook her head to his question though. "Should I put that on the list?"

[longforgottenpromise]

"When we get back to the train I can show you if you want." He smiled softly, "We can watch a cartoon together."

He hadn't watched many things in the cinema car himself. But Tidus and Lord Gyousou had been watching an anime about Blitzball. So he knows there are cartoon to choose from.

[nobodys_puppet]

She gave a small shrug. How was she supposed to know if she wanted to?

[longforgottenpromise]

He looked down again, falling into silence himself. He hoped she hadn't minded... He didn't want to force his company on her. He guessed he could just show her the cinema, let her watch the cartoons with Lea.

[nobodys_puppet]

She was not the sort who felt the need to add words to silence, so she stayed quiet herself.

[longforgottenpromise]

The silence drew on, the cave glowing around them. Taiki looked around again, no exit was apparant. He had no idea how they were here or how they should get out.

But that feeling is still there, the door would open when the time is right. There was something they needed to do here and all there was to do was talk... Even if talking is not something easy for either of them.

"Um... The memories I saw. You went to school?"

It had not been like his own school, but he recognised it as such.

[nobodys_puppet]

She blinked, then nodded. "I thought I had failed, because I woke up on the way to this weird place. My magic didn't work and they said we had to go to school or our powers would destroy us." She shrugged. "I thought I still needed to die so..."

[longforgottenpromise]

"Oh." He nodded, "So you thought... You hadn't succeeded in being forgotten."

Clearly she hadn't died. Or maybe... Who knew. The worlds were strange places after all. But she had thought she had failed. "That must have been hard for you, to adjust I mean."

[nobodys_puppet]

She shrugged a bit. "I kept trying." she said it as though she was trying to assure him she didn't slack off. Or... trying to convince herself of the same.

[longforgottenpromise]

The words made him sad, made sadness stab through him. She had kept trying... to be forgotten. To avoid those who might know her.

"But it was alright... Lea remembered you and it was alright."

CW: suicide mentions.

[nobodys_puppet]

She kept trying to kill herself before anyone new could know and remember her, yes.

She nodded. "Once Axel remembered me, and told me I had succeeded, I stopped trying," she agreed. "Roxas said the same thing." As did Saïx, but the less she mentioned him, the better for everyone. She looked out at the distance though, as if seeing past the cave, remembering what Saïx had wanted them all to do in Daitu. To go back to the wheres and whens they belonged.

"That is still in my future though. At some point..." her voice broke, her hands curled into fists. "At some point we have to go back. And I know that it will be okay in the end, but until then I have to go back to my time, when I am gone and no one remembers me. And when I come back, I do not know if I'll be able to remember any of this."

She turned away and walked to the wall, resting a hand on it. "Everyone keeps telling me I am a person now, but if the memories that make up this new person are taken away... Isn't that still like ceasing to exist?" she asked softly.

And if that is the case...

"If I am just going to have to die again," she said softly, "And I won't remember any of this, and no one I meet now will remember me either..." then it was better for everyone if she didn't have any more friends. But Axel never seemed to understand that. For as smart as he was, he could be a bit blind when it came to her and Roxas. He saw what he wanted to see, he saw only the parts that let him keep his friends with him. She knew that, she understood it now. Perhaps she had for a while. It was something she didn't think Roxas had ever understood, however... One of the few things different between them, even back then.

[longforgottenpromise]

If memories are what makes a person, does forgetting mean you cease to exist?

It's a painful question. Painful on it's own, more painful with her context. She had been forgotten and even though she was remembered again... She had to go back? She had to go back and be forgotten again and she might not remember... any of this.

"When... I forgot once." He looked at her with sad eyes. I forgot fourteen months of my life but they were... they were the most important. I forgot who I was. I forgot what I was. I forgot my king..." He shook his head.

"I don't think it's possible to fully forget. Lea said. In the memory I just saw... Lea said... He could tell something was missing... It is like that. People don't just... When they remember. I think they will remember these places too."

[nobodys_puppet]

"Doesn't that just hurt more then? To remember only that something is missing, but not know what?"

[longforgottenpromise]

"It hurt more than any other pain I have ever known." The answer is quiet, brutally honest. "It was like their was a hole inside me, the knowledge that I'd forgotten something and what I had forgotten... It was the most important thing. Something that should never have been forgotten."

It's only been just over a year since he remembered, since that night on the beach when Renrin had, in her desperation, changed forms to show him, when all his memories flooded back.

"I... I understand it is necessary, this forgetting." He wished it wasn't, that there was a way to change her future, so such a thing wasn't necessary. "But the joy they will feel when they know you again..." It wasn't even something he could describe in words.

[nobodys_puppet]

"....Joy.....?" she glanced back at him, confused.

[longforgottenpromise]

"Yes." He nodded at her again, "Lea was very happy, to remember you again."

Relief, joy. She had felt them too, even if she didn't recognise them as such.

[nobodys_puppet]

"But he had to be upset first."

[longforgottenpromise]

He reached out his other hand, so both hands were cupping hers. "That... I wish that could be different. But I don't know about your world. It sounded like... it was something that had to happen."

For all that that was a terrible thing. People shouldn't be hurt, necessity or not.

[nobodys_puppet]

"And it will have to happen again," she pointed out to him. "And he only remembered me when he saw me again." If she made any fiends here, they would never remember her, would they? She considered a moment. "Maybe Naminé would know."

[longforgottenpromise]

But does it? He only half understands her story, pieced together from what she told him when they met and what he had overheard in these memories. But does it have to be that way? She has been out of her world? How would she even get back and need to do it? Surely she had disappeared, the world would have... changed. The world she went back to... It would not be the same world that she left. Time did not stand still.

If only it did. The pain of Tai would not be so great if somehow there had been a way for everything to... wait.

"You are from the same world as Naminé?" He didn't know her well, but her stories had been sad as well.