#witchofremembrance

[valorxdrive]

"s o r a . . . ?"

Again, a little louder this time--a girl's voice slithers out of the vents in the room, the radio turns on and it emits the same awful, keening name:

"Sora...?"

And very suddenly the lights start flickering in the apartment, as if someone is flicking the light switches all at the same time, quickly, over and over again...

"WHERE ARE YOU?!"

The television snaps on then and over the screen there's Namine sitting in white space, knees pressed to her chest... but her drawings are also there, surrounding her, hanging in all that emptiness so that the only thing she can witness are all those tormenting memories looming about her.

Namine sobs, rocking a little, clasping her hands over her ears tightly--

"Sora, Sora--I'm so sorry... I'm so sorry..."

And on the screen Sora appears too, but he's smaller here, young and carefree, and he smiles sadly onto Namine...

"It's like this... I'm really not happy about you messing with my memories," the young Sora says to her, a little mournfully even as he tries to smile. But he presses on bravely, "But you know--I can't really get mad at you for it, either..."

And then another Sora appears, but he's a little older now, wearing a black jacket and pants, the crown necklace glittering around his neck--it's as he looked before, back when he first discovered Roxas.

"These memories you gave me... in my head, I know they're lies--but they still feel right. Like the promise I made. I said I would protect you and I wouldn't make you cry... not ever," the Sora in black tells her, but it only makes Namine cry harder.

Finally, the last Sora settles behind Namine, appearing as he does now--red and black clothes and a smile still fixed on his face, even if it is a little more worn.

"Namine, if you cry now, I'll feel guilty--like I let you down," this last Sora finishes.

"Stop! Stop!" Namine gasps, staring blankly at the floor as she sobs. "I'm sorry! I'm so sorry!"

But then all the Soras merely repeat their lines, one by one, until it is a drone of apologies and mistakes and regrets--

Namine SCREAMS--

But then... the image on the screen pauses, everyone freezing, Namine's terrible screech abruptly cut off--

Another voice oozes into the room then, cool and crisp, no emotion in their tone... the funny part is it sounds like Namine...

"I know you want to go back to the Realm of Light--it's what you desire most right now," the eerie voice says, seemingly coming from everywhere. Or is it merely inside his head...? "Your memories make it obvious... use the Power of Waking, Sora. I can chain you back to the Realm of Light... but you can only remain in that Reality for three days."

The voice pauses before it continues, as if giving him a moment to consider the awful image on the screen and her offer between them.

"Do you understand? I can only keep you in another Reality for so long without a vessel for your heart... but the connections and memories you made will be enough for me to keep you here temporarily," the girl's voice explains methodically, as if she's checking off a list she's made, making sure all the important points have been spoken.

And then she says, with a little too much sweetness: "This is what you want, isn't it? Another chance to save your friends, another moment to play hero... but, of course, you could go anywhere with your three days..."

The television flickers onto an image of Destiny Islands, palms trees swaying and a beautiful sunset bleeding onto the ocean...

Then the channel changes again: it's Twilight Town now on the screen, but a sprawling building that's a twisted version of Castle Oblivion looms in the very same forest the Old Mansion once lingered inside.

"Use the Power of Waking and I'll meet you there in the dark. You can let me know where you want to go after that..."

The television snaps off, the lights remain on and undisturbed, the radio is quiet... everything is exactly as it was...

Except for the choice that falls into Sora's hands now.

♕ - What cleaves through the peaceful semblance of sleep would be his name. A voice that draws familiar echoes in a constant rhythm through the heart, that mighty vessel recognizing the companion who calls out to him amidst this peaceful, self-made emptiness for rest. Yet it elevates, growing serrated as the agonizing screech of machinery immediately bolts him awake, tucked full of heavy drowsiness as some inaudible grunt follows suit.

Bracing upon the bed, he immediately lifts, the constant pound of his heart reflecting the concerned sentiment that begets fear due to the raw panic held within that voice. "Nami..!?" However, it's amidst this swirling chaos, another anomaly regulating its presence within his apartment that throws him onto his feet. Trained senses tear away from any sense of comfort, instead depending on the sharpened tension to break the haze away from his mind.

That itch to allow his Keyblade's song to ring bolsters further by the second.

Any such thought is stamped heavily the instant he realizes who exactly is on that screen. Step by step does he edges close, confusion, relief.. the primal pool of emotions managed to derive an unsettled feeling from all of this as well. Part of him swears he could feel the alien energy that drew upon his particular apartment complex akin to miasma within this moment. Sora's features are soon brightened by the pristine eeriness of that room Namine settles within.

Not to mention who joins her, differing ages, those same blue eyes, alternations of that spiky brown hair despite the ivory crown that rests upon his clothed breast. It rattles a disturbed sensation upon his spine within an instant as he immediately advances towards the television, fingers bracing upon its edges as the agony within her tone tears such a blinding sense of concern within his chest. "Namine! Namine, hey! I'm here! Can you..!?" Part of him gets the idea its not that simple.

While the protective urge boils alongside a mystery that manages to scratch a remote part of his skull, any billowing ideas are rendered to a screeching halt the instant her fair lips are compelled to scream as a showcase of this agony. ..Yet, why does it feel stuttered within that same breath?

His answer arrives in a voice that's directed with a clinical tint. Professional, unaffected, many qualities that draws a sense of disgust within the hero in that moment. The mere fact they can allow the poisonous ichor of deals, a disconnect from the sight before him, an urge to weight his presence upon them is gridlocked by not only what he just saw.

Its what they offer that draws such a shaken breath stirred.. alongside a frantic beat of his heart..'

Their offer is drawn as he takes a step back from the television, as if that same poison, temptation finds itself being painted in a pristine sense of saccharine. What's shown before him, these sights, what they focus upon were his desires that simmer and ache for an easier means to accomplish his goals. One such opportunity arrives right now, held by a hand in the dark, further prices being drawn on how this matter can be approached.

"Just who are--!?"

The room goes dark. The grating noises cools into silence. Sora finds himself alone once again.

"...."

That door to his flat never slammed open quicker as the keybearer stormed out of it. His authority alone willed the door shut and locked as an immediate impulse to just tear away from this suffocating sort of position in the physical sense overriding his desires in that moment. Constant swirls of his voice saying things he never remembered, things that TV bound Namine recognized.. and how it oh so accurately depicted familiarity within his heart, that edging pain that always seem to grate into her sweet voice.

The offer hangs. For how long? Would they hold true to his wishes?

Is there another hidden lining upon this contract forged in gilded parchment?

"Namine should be okay.. Should, I remember helping her get released from Kairi's being.. Gotta calm down." He focuses upon that inner energy and voice that lends its guidance. Past experiences have to be his foundation before any particular steps are made. ..Is there anything he can find out about them beforehand?

That idea sticks to Sora the further he prods upon it. If they have a means to draw a connection to him.

There has to be a viewpoint he's missing on this! Hope clicks strong as he presses into the rolling winds of Quadratum's city life.

"Just what can I do?"

@witchofremembrance

[europarph]

finished commission of a complex edit for @witchofremembrance.    tysm for your support!    ♡

[regnantlight]

|| @witchofremembrance​ || Plotted Starter || ​

    She’s lonely, she thinks. It’s difficult to remember. Decades upon decades of endless war and a dark, vacant void had left memories of her humanity faint, like embers of an old flame that had nearly forgotten the sensation of heat. Even the voice of Calamity would have been a welcomed bit of company, slithering and demeaning as it was. For now, however, Calamity— Ganondorf— what was left of him— was subdued, and Zelda was left alone in the great, vast silence as the world carried on without her.

     It is a fantastical burden, being aware of everything at once. For a time, it kept her occupied. She waited, in those quiet moments between violence, for new knowledge to appear. Purah moved her research to Hateno Village. Impa had a daughter, and a granddaughter, and became an elderly woman. Sidon grew to be the tall, valiant Prince that the Zora’s needed him to be. Link slept. He was healing, slowly. Painstakingly slowly. But he was healing, bit by bit, with every passing handful of years. 

     But eventually, the knowledge stopped being appealing. Villages rose and fell, the descendants of her fallen Champion’s grew, and life crept on at an agonizing pace. Yes, she thinks— she is lonely.  

      Perhaps that’s what calls her to that thread, a tiny sliver of reality that just barely connects to her own. It’s warm, and it’s peaceful, and, Zelda is almost certain, it is also lonely. So she follows it while Calamity slumbers, pulling and stretching the thread until it shapes a door for her to step through, and in it she finds nothing but light and a small, pale girl in a white dress— and Zelda finds that she does not know this place or who the girl could be. It was a wonderful feeling, not knowing. She had nearly forgotten what that felt like, too. But oh, Zelda— this Zelda in this current life— she loved not knowing, if only to learn. 

     “Hello,” she speaks softly, waiting for the girl she did not know to look up. “Who are you?”

[valorxdrive]

"Sora....?"

"Sora?"

"Sora, I found you!"

And when Sora opens his eyes, Namine is there among the backdrop of skyscrapers framed in the room's many windows. She looks as wispy and ethereal as ever, as if a stray breeze might blow her away--he can almost see right through her, the buildings' silhouettes visible even as she moves to block them. She truly looks like the ghost she always felt like.

There's the urge to throw her barely-there arms around him, to cry as he looks at her. But Namine carefully controls the emotions roaring inside her--she buries the wish to sob so deeply in this wretched heart of hers that she drowns it. Instead, she slowly clasps her hands behind her back, regarding Sora with the same faint smile she always wears.

"I don't have much time," Namine tells him, canting her head with that mysterious, bewitching smile curled over her lips. "Right now--I'm not really here, only... a part of me is here in this Reality..."

She takes a step to him, yet still lingers a safe, reasonable distance away from him, her feet hesitating on the carpet.

"I'm dreaming in our Reality on Destiny Islands, but I found a way to skip Realities through your memories. I followed the chain here, by skipping through memories of people connected to you--they lead me here, but..."

She turns slightly away from him, regarding the sleek room and the world outside full of such tall buildings she's never seen before, they seem so impossible.

"Like I said, I don't have much time. Once I wake up in my Reality, I have to go back. If I don't, I risk becoming trapped here," she tells him softly, her tone crumbling like ash--a piece of her wants to stay, but a larger part of her knows she's needed at home. "I'll come back though, once I'm asleep again."

Her eyes are watery, like pools of watercolors bleeding together.

"Is there anything you want me to tell... Kairi? Or Riku? They've--been looking for you everywhere," she says, her smile a little more worn, sadder. She doesn't deserve any words from Sora, she's well-aware. But she's willing to carry a message for him back home to the people that truly love and cherish him--not someone like her, a witch with the powers to torment his memories... she's better like this--a messenger, a temporary fixture in his life.

A ghost from the past haunting his perfect days...

♕ - That couldn’t be. A voice so familiar, one that exemplifies the cool rush of the rolling waves of the ocean itself. For all the fortitude he managed to compact into the decision of embracing sacrifice in the name of his beloved friends, for so many to get their lives started, could there truly be a force out there that wanted to make the weight of a cruel hope to pack itself into his chest?

Except... that call of his name didn’t find itself paused, stopped or evaporated into the realms of hopeful whimsy. Being declared as found caused the annals of sleep itself to be rapidly torn away, for the hero’s eyes to open in such speed that inklings of pains snagged at it’s grip as he rises.

Try as he might to associate any semblance of balance into this moment, that desperate, thorny and hope led to him fighting through that pain, all in order to see a voice so heavily associated from the very cosmos he came from. What slams through him is a sense of joyous, pained disbelief finding that blonde field of hair that ran like angelic gold, coupled together with those very eyes that were stuck in a similar stance as his. He couldn’t believe a hope this nigh impossible.

“N.. Namine..?” No matter how much time has passed, how many conditions tethered and wrapped by countless realities and rules, burning within breast is the indomitable determination of those feelings that burned into resolve since their times set in the world of Sea and Sky. Deep down, after seeing how much care she held for people while held on the precarious balance of becoming a melded force of shadow as ethereal ivory, the decision to ensure she could have a future as bright as the hope her drawings carried..

....? Wait, what?

Sadly time wasn’t a resource that didn’t intend to be any form of kind. He could see it with the melancholic air that’s settled around her phantasmal figure. Every part of him wanted to trudge forth and immediately  meet her with an embrace that practically crushes her against him. To allow her rest, refuge and also to selfishly soak in the moment they’ve reunited, the comfort of shared warmth. Yet? An alien fear settles, the magical condition of a dream, how good things could never interact with for long periods. There was a heart rumbling pain to the way her sweet smile conveys a sentiment they’ve both come to understand. All it left Sora with was the choice of enduring that burn, to keep frozen and keep those instincts of his wishes tightly leashed.

“And you managed a miracle like that?” From the way his disbelieving chuckle echoes, how that twist of sentiment bloom in such a moment..

She was incredible. Unknown feelings that slither int he darkness of his heart, the brand that remains locked and held in the light, part of him wonders dares to wonder if she could ever see these things about herself. “Namine, ..You’re amazing.”

Whereas the complexities of this metropolis, a constant hub of bustle not kissed by the blanket of night and a shimmering move above, it remained an island of lights, activity itself with the power of human ingenuity fueling those very buildings. ...And in all honesty? Sora could find himself truly caring less about any of that in this moment. It was taking everything not to accidentally disrupt the arrival of someone who became his hope through her efforts.

..What did he even do to deserve her help to this extent, truly? It was an odd question that always scratched at the back of his mind, frustration drawing forth an itchiness as if he knows... Used to know.

Bit by bit, his feet crossed that polished wood surface, his heart echoing painfully in a need to bring her over, a fear that he’s silently fraying apart the unbelievably miracle all the same. Just enough. He wanted to be at a point where the many lights outside couldn’t tear his focus away from the spirit of Namine who kept the reality of their situation brief and concise.. yet, not without it’s kindness. Being allowed the grounds of a freedom he didn’t imagine having anytime soon, it slams him into breathlessness, tinges of worried concern bubbling with the elevated pace of his heart. So many times his emotions easily knew the means to say, so why the fear now? What was this damnable concern about how much time they carried?!

“I..” There’s a pause in his thoughts while he reflects on those final moments shared way back then. Him and all his friends together, him proudly carrying a secret of limited time, enjoying the waking dream of all of them simply kicking back to enjoy a future together... Almost.

No matter the situation. Sora knew that another call was going to lead him out into the stars irregardless. No different then how Namine went through such incredible lengths to find him, to support all of them, the gratitude is river of calm that brings him an instance of peace...

“Tell them, I’m okay. Things were a bit scary for me at first... but, I’m not gonna let their faith fade away by being in real trouble, I’m holding up fine as I can manage. I found even more hope, a hero.”

”Tell them that Namine is that person. The person who braved so much to find me, and how I can’t thank her enough...” He’s inevitably and contently the first one to crack. It was a burn that felt alleviated despite the pains of it coming forth. Even his voice hovered onto the precipice due to the heaviness of a tone balancing happy tears. A single streak of heat drips down his cheek as the look he offers her was undeniably hopeful.  All the same, he hates how he can’t recall what transpired for him to deserve someone like her, only left with a small leafet from a journal that describe to solely Thank Namine.

By Hearts she deserved it, and he needed to find that reason why. The original reason had to of shared.

“Could you please do that for me? I want to count on you more than anything.”

@witchofremembrance

[valorxdrive]

Magic I’m so lookin’ at you and this whole damn feels train of an ask you piledrived into my inbox.

got full blown distracted from what I was writin!!

@witchofremembrance​