*********** Love You) Chapter LV:RemembranceFollow

AUTHOR’S NOTE: Wrote this last night while waiting for an SP pickup assault to happen (that never really did -.-;; ). I’ll try to write some this weekend, if I can find the time. I –really- want to finish Kasho VIII and get onto Part IX before the end of August.

Update: Wrote this on Friday, tried to post it but the servers were messed up ;_; So anyways, here it is, with text this time.

Read and review, yada yada.

Previous chapters, aki, and Interludes

Part I - Connection (Enishi)

Kasho II - Kodoku (Solitude)

Part III - Reunion (Saikai)

Kasho IV- Suriyoru (Closer)

Part V- Secrets (Hiou)

Kasho VI- Hanarebanare (Apart)

Part VII- Longing (Akogare)
---
(Chapter LI)
http://ffxi.allakhazam.com/forum.html?forum=10&mid=1151677343267156940

(Aki LII)
http://ffxi.allakhazam.com/forum.html?forum=35;mid=1153741144155412598;page=1#1153741144155412598

(Chapter LIII)
http://ffxi.allakhazam.com/forum.html?forum=35&mid=1153826582161798543

(Aki LIV)
http://ffxi.allakhazam.com/forum.html?forum=35&mid=1153916754204093916
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Bonus Story: Rainfall Memories
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Chapter LV: Remembrance
***
"Where are we going?" Hitomi asked as I carefully guided her by the hand around the frozen orc’s corpse upon the floor.

"We’re going back to where I lived, above the Alchemy shop." I replied softly, dipping my head out of the doorway to scan both sides of the street and the buildings above for possible beastmen threats. When I saw that the pathway was clear I pulled Hitomi out, catching her as she nearly stumbled over some loose rubble next to the door.

"What there Dimitri-chan?..." She asked me, staying close and keeping a professional eye watching our backs as we made our way down the street.

I ducked under a fallen wooden beam that had partly broken away from a suspended walkway overhead and had managed to partially obstruct our passage down the roadway. "A drawing, of some sort, I don’t really remember...I think it’s something called the Eruntalon Code." When I said those last two words my mind futilely tried to grasp at some memories that seemed to grow ever more elusive with every passing second.

Hitomi gasped in surprise however at this. "You found it?" she said excitedly.

"Apparently so...I don’t really remember..." I replied, getting more and more frustrated with myself.

Hitomi squeezed my hand gently in sympathy, and we made our way back to the Alchemy guild where I had been living in the loft above for the past few months. To my immense surprise the building itself had not been really touched by the immense destruction going on about it, save for the alchemy sign being torn off of it’s dangling swing and laying down at the base of the pole. Opening the door to the guild, I was suddenly awash in a sea of darkness, for despite the unlocked entryway, I could tell that the building was abandoned. Squinting hard, I could barely tell that nearly all of the chemicals and potions that I was accustomed to seeing lining the various walls and tables were missing, and the distinctive smells and sounds were also conspicuously absent. Finding that Hitomi wasn’t really willing to let go of my hand for even an instant I took us slowly forward a few steps, and then suddenly felt a sharp pain rush through my right knee.

Looking down to check out the source of my pain, I could see that despite having Koenig leggings for protection, I had managed to bash my right knee into a low raised table incredibly hard. Biting my bottom lip hard enough to make it bleed, I fought back the urge to curse the piece of ******* furniture to Mordion Gaol and back in front of Hitomi.

Sonofabitch!

Hitomi only giggled slightly, and then turned her free hand upwards, twisting her fingers around in what I saw out of the corner of my eye as a tier-one spell configuration. Instantly, a warm red glow appeared in her gloved hand and as she held it up slightly, it instantly enveloped the room in light.
Rubbing my banged knee through the armor slightly, I winced as I straightened my leg out fully and then started to half-hobble towards the back of the lab where the stairs that would lead to my place were. Without asking her to, Hitomi put my arm of my injured leg’s side around her shoulders for support, all the while keeping the flame lit with her free arm and hand.

"Thanks butterfly." I grunted out, the pain lessening with Hitomi’s support. Hitomi only kissed my cheek in response before letting me go up the stairs in front of her. My right hand touched the railing, and I braced myself against it as I worked my way upwards towards the top landing. It took a couple minutes, but I finally made it.

Not bothering to fumble for my keys, I simply drew my sword and slammed the sharp edge of it against the metal doorknob. With a slight grating sound the sword cleanly cut through the metal at the bulb’s base, and the door swung silently open as the newly severed piece fell to the tiled floor. Stepping in, I could tell that the place was still as impeccably clean as I had left it just a mere few hours before.

"Where is it?" Hitomi asked me, as she more or less pushed me down upon a couch then using her flame to light a few candles I had scattered about the place for a source of light to aid in the search, before putting out her own magic fireball.

"I don’t know...here, let me get up to hel-" I tried to stand up, but a single glare from Hitomi was enough to send me back down into place. I turned myself to where I could prop my leg upon the couch, and I started to take off the lower half of the body armor to get where I had bashed my knee.

"I start in bedroom and look for drawing." Hitomi said without bothering to wait for a response from me as she headed towards the only other room in the place. She carefully shut the door, and I could dimly hear sounds as she opened and closed drawers and rummaging through the few belongings that I had accumulated during my stay here.

While she was doing that, I had finally managed to pry off the Koenig diechlings from my body, dropping them with a small clattering sound upon the floor next to me.

Looking down at my knee, I could easily tell that it was turning a dark purple bruised color and I winced at the sight of it. Reaching over then to a small side table, I pried open the drawer that was inset into it and extracted out a small bottle from all the junk that was in there. Holding it up to the light of a nearby candle, I checked the bottle’s label to ensure that it did indeed say 'Hi-pot' on it and then I peered through it’s bluish-green coloring and ensured that the potion’s contents itself had not clumped up any during the past few months. Finally satisfied, I uncorked it with a faint pop sound and then began to rub the liquid into the wounded area methodically. Almost instantly, the swelling started to go down, and I felt a huge sign of relief flow through my body.

Recorking the remaining contents of the bottle and stuffing it into a small side pocket of my main body piece, I then managed to fully redress myself by the time that Hitomi came back into the room. As she walked out, I could see her hold up a small cream-colored piece of folded paper in one hand...

And two dried flowers that had intertwined around each other in the other.

They had gathered abit of dust on them, but they were as perfectly in sync with each other as ever. At the sight of them, I blushed slightly and fidgeted in my spot upon the couch.

"You kept flowers..." Hitomi said in a bashful tone in her voice and in her eyes, before handing them back to me delicately with a kiss that she let linger against my lips. As soon as I got the floral sculpture trapped between my own hands, I saw her go back to being all business as she then opened up the folded piece of paper in her other hand to reveal a beautifully detailed picture of a pheonix.

At the sight of the picture...It felt as if someone had just dumped a cold bucket of ice from Bearclaw Pinnacle upon my face, letting the jagged cubes drip all over my body.

Meeting ‘Papa’ Gilgamesh in Jeuno.

The barfight in Mhuara.

Encountering Fenrir.

Elayne funeral...

It’s all coming back to me!

I finally began to comprehend exactly what was happening here to me.

"Hitomi...something’s going on here...someone or something blocked all my memories connected to that-" at that I pointed at the piece of paper she was holding-"because for some odd reason I didn’t remember having something as important as that until just now..."

An explosion nearby broke my sentence up instantly, and I realized that Hitomi and I had to get out of here NOW before the beastmen totally overran the newly fallen capital.

Snatching the drawing from her and then shoving it down next to the potion in my armor’s pocket, I more or less pushed Hitomi back out the door, down the stairs, and back out upon the street.

"Let’s get out of here."

-fin Chapter LV: Remembrance


Edited, Jul 31st 2006 at 10:08am EDT by Nightsintdreams