As Axel sat, his mind a mess with his emotions screaming and running around with a mix of confusion, joy, and relief, he saw that he and Kyle had been left alone in the clearing.
"Ido and Xenon said they would go meet up with the High Council of Magic," Kyle said. "The other creature dudes went off with them, all except Qassot. She's resting in a hollow over there. Apparently she's not well enough for teleportation or major movement yet."
Axel nodded absent-mindedly, his mind preoccupied with something that seemed to both exist and not exist at the same time.
"Ido told me where the High Council's hideout was, so we can go join them whenever we feel like."
Axel stared blankly around at the forest, so familiar yet so distant.
"Or not," Kyle continued, shrugging. "It's not like we have to keep helping them. We don't even have to give up our magic or anything. We can be like the protagonists of those novels you always used to read."
Axel continued gazing blankly around at everything, struggling to comprehend his own self. Kyle sat down and leaned back on the tree next to Axel.
"Our work is done," Kyle said, letting out a satisfied sigh. "We can return to our lives and the families we left behind so long ago. Hey, what do you think happened after we were taken? Were we declared missing, dead, or do we have like, body doubles now or something?"
"Leave me alone for a bit," Axel said quietly. His voice was remarkably calm for all the emotions crashing around his heat. "I need to think."
Kyle's eyes widened. There was an important fact that they had forgotten. "Oh, right. Still no memories. My bad."
Kyle glanced worriedly at Axel as he stood and walked away into the woods, but left Axel alone with his thoughts. "I'll be hanging out with Qassot if you need me."
Axel didn't respond, rather falling back into his struggle to find the fog-covered memories that were locked deep within his brain.
A sudden ding broke Axel's reverie. A light noise, the notification sound from a phone. A sound Axel had not heard in a long time, yet his mind recognized it as a familiar part of everyday life. The ding was quickly followed by another, and yet another.
Axel walked over to where his backpack lay, leaning against a tree. Either the Gem Keepers, Kyle, Xenon, or Ido were kind enough to bring his backpack along with them as they escaped through the portal, and had generously left it there for him. Axel carefully walked over to the backpack and unzipped it, reaching in and pulling out his phone, which was still dinging aggressively. He checked the battery and the time.
3:58 AM.
33%.
Looks like the portable charger ran out of juice partway through. It was understandable, seeing how old it was.
Axel quietly unlocked his phone and checked the notifications.
It was a text message.
Mari (87 unread messages)
The number was still ticking up.
But Axel wasn't focused on it.
He was focused on the name.
Mari.
Where had he heard that name before?
Deep within his mind, something long imprisoned by some force, struggling with all its might against the shackles of oblivion, finally broke the final chain.
Axel fell still, his heart speeding up as the fog in his mind cleared.
In a sudden rush and an immense chill like the buzz of electricity running down his spine, something clicked in his mind. The fog cleared. The floodgates opened.
That was the name of his sister.
A torrent of memories came rushing down on him all at once.
The smiling face of his sister, three years younger than him.
The ever-worried yet wise father of his, constantly lecturing him about finances and stocks.
The kind yet stern queen of the family, his mother, whose voice calling Axel to get up in the morning worked ten times better than any alarm clock.
The lively white cat they used to own, before she ran off and was never seen again.
The school he used to go to, full of acquaintances and a few unsavory characters.
His favorite sandwich shop on the corner, which he would always visit when he forgot his lunch.
The dingy school bathrooms that made Axel always hold it in until he got home.
The annoyingly bumpy streets near the school that clearly needed to be repaved.
The clearing in the forest which they held Mari's birthday party in, when he stayed up all night trying to figure out how to bake a cake and ended up falling asleep in the middle of it.
Axel's favorite teacher, who always seemed to have an old history quote that somehow perfectly fit the situation.
That one random girl he became friends with at the amusement park but never saw again.
The video games and books he had neatly arranged at home, which he would indulge in a little too much.
Everything, all at once, came rushing into his head. The confusion, excitement, joy, nostalgia, and relief came rushing through his skull as a smile gradually broke out across his face.
A single tear escaped Axel's rapidly blurring vision and dripped down his face, shining in the moonlight as it fell onto his phone.
Happiness coursed through Axel as he stood there, staring up at the sky, beaming with such peace and joy that anyone who passed by would think that he had reached glorious enlightenment.
Axel's voice, laced with ecstasy, rose up into the night in a quiet whisper.
"I finally remember."
His deep-rooted desire, the one that buried itself deep within him, even as he fought for his life, never rearing its head but making brutally clear all of its effects, was finally fulfilled. The corners of his mouth began to twitch upwards irresistibly, and a brilliant light shone from the depths of his soul as he looked up into the sky and saw a familiar full moon.
A truly radiant smile lit up the dark night like a lighthouse.
The first true smile, coming out of pure joy and nothing else, that had ever crossed Axel's face since he had fallen into Argean.
-
In a dark room, comfortably furnished with a bed, a desk, a few cushions, posters on the walls, and a neat and tidy air, a young girl woke up. Her short brown hair that fell to her shoulders was messy and unkempt as she had woken up in the middle of the night. She rubbed her eyes and yawned, unplugging her phone from where it was charging on the small table at her bedside. She turned the phone on, flinching slightly at the sudden bright light that flooded the bedroom.
3:14 AM.
The girl groaned and flopped back into bed, turning her phone on and scrolling aimlessly through her apps as she lay there.
She couldn't sleep.
She didn't feel like browsing social media.
The girl sighed and opened her texting app.
Like every other time she woke up in the middle of the night.
She scrolled past messages with her parents, group conversations with classmates about projects, and long conversations with friends about the newest album their favorite band released.
She scrolled down to the bottom and opened a conversation that seemed more like a one-sided interrogation.
The name of the contact read "Brother".
The girl sighed sadly and looked through the messages. Just like how a spiteful person might use a conversation with someone who blocked them as a shopping list, she had been constantly texting this one person without expecting a response.
This person was her brother, who had been swept into the sea in a freak tsunami incident. The girl let out a long sigh as she kept scrolling, then stopped at the very last message he had sent her.
Gonna go hang with friends at the beach later.
The girl's eyes drifted down to the timestamp next to the message.
4 years ago.
The girl stared blankly at her 13 year-old self's messages, back when she was blissfully unaware of what had happened.
When are you coming back?
Are you blind?
Stop ignoring me!
I'm telling mom.
It's been five hours. Did you get a girlfriend suddenly?
It was around then that she had heard the sound of the news in the living room.
A tsunami had hit without any of the traditional warning signs and washed some people out to sea. A freak incident that struck the beach near her brother's high school.
Are you okay?
Answer me.
Are you okay?
Are you okay?
After a feverish night of work, almost a hundred people had been rescued by the coast guard and good-natured fishermen who decided to lend a hand. Everyone had been rescued.
Well, almost everyone.
Her brother and his best friend hadn't been found.
The girl's fingers hovered over the keys. Every time she couldn't sleep, she ended up texting him. She didn't expect a response, and didn't get her hopes up. Sometimes the messages she sent were playful, asking when he would take her to eat her favorite sushi, or teasing him about playing video games all day instead of getting a girlfriend. Sometimes the messages were purposefully annoying, threatening to tell their parents if he didn't get her the gift she wanted for her birthday, or bugging him about when he was going to actually go outside for once. Sometimes the messages were simple and nonsensical, like names of characters from his favorite video game, or the titles of his favorite movies. The girl's breath became slightly shaky and her eyes started blurring. She wiped her eyes and looked back at her phone. Her chest was hurting. Not knowing how to deal with the throbbing of her heart or the tears that sprung up suddenly, her fingers moved to type on the phone.
I miss you.
Teardrops fell on her phone as she sat up in bed and curled up, crying.
The night wore on. Her quiet sobs stopped. She gradually uncurled and picked her phone back up, staring at the message that she didn't send. She took a deep but shaky breath, eyes still red, and sent it.
She then turned her phone off, curled up, and tried to go back to sleep, resolving to banish such thoughts from her mind and be fully restored for tomorrow.
Just like every other time she couldn't sleep at night.
A sound suddenly rang from her phone. Someone messaged her. Not knowing who could be texting her this late at night, she turned her phone back on.
Her eyes shot open, all fatigue gone, as she almost dropped her phone.
Her breaths came in ragged pants as she unlocked her phone with shaky, tearstained fingers and opened the message app.
She rubbed her eyes with her free hand.
She wasn't sleeping.
She stared at the only unread message on her phone, at the top of her conversation list.
Brother (1 unread message)