- Present Day -Phi leaned against the wall and tapped her fingers against her arm impatiently. "Jeez, what the hell is taking so long? We're waiting on Borock-butt, right?" She asked.
"Endearing name," Arche muttered. "Maybe something came up and he's preoccupied. I'm in no rush, anyway." He kicked up his feet and reclined back in the chair.
"You seem awfully calm. Need I remind you of the encroaching battle to come?" She stared at Arche, "Not to mention all the [parasitic bomb] about the Morphogenetic Field."
He chuckled, "Heh, your explanations are still brewing in my head. Alternate timelines, subconscious communication... of course it's still rattling my brain. But, honestly, I'm not calm at all. Like you said, how could I be?"
He leaned forward in the chair. "Most of all, what I want to know about-" He paused for a moment, "is Luna. We established that you were erased from my memories somehow, therefore, I didn't make the connection between you two. Now, that's still hard to process, because with how close I was to your sister, I'd imagine it would be impossible to have forgotten you..."
"Nothing is impossible, Arche." Phi fiddled with one of her crossbow arrows.
"After everything you told me, yeah, I guess I'm inclined to agree." Arche sighed. "Anyway, what exactly happened? I mean, you were there when Luna... when the incident happened."
Phi stopped and quietly responded, "I was."
Arche continued. "The thing is, when I ran out of that building, I can't seem to recall all the details. I remember running through the halls, with the floor and ceiling crumbling everywhere I looked, but there was something odd: Some weird white figure was next to me. It wasn't even running, just... it was there; it was like it was floating next to me, then it suddenly disappeared. It's even in my dreams."
"A white figure." Phi repeated. "Jesus Christ, someone really did a number on your memories. Archetype, who did you run out of that building with?"
Arche paused for a moment. "I... ran out by myself. No one was... there." He slowed down his speech the more he spoke about his escape.
"You seem unsure about it." Phi stepped closer to him and spoke sadly, "Who was with you?"
Arche struggled to remember. It was like a boulder was sitting on his brain, as odd as that sounds, preventing him from remembering. "I don't... I..."
Suddenly, a flash of images surfaced and burned itself into his mind. He was sent into a trance...
'Hang in there! I'm gonna get you out of this! JUST HANG ON!' A young girl was cradled into a man's arms. Arche wasn't sure what he was looking at, until the perspective shifted onto the surroundings. Bright, burning flames running across white dull walls surrounded the two people and he ran through the hallway. It was that fateful night.
The perspective shifted again, onto the girl; a small girl with white hair, covered in a few bruises.
Another flash happened, and his trance now placed him outside of the burning building. *cough* *cough* *cough* He delicately placed the white-haired child beside him, while he tended to his own wound, which he didn't even notice he had until then. 'Are you all right, Phi?'
A third flash appeared and Arche's mind was immediately sent outside of the trance. He was conscious again.
"Arche? Arche, what just happened? You zoned out for, like, 10 seconds." Phi asked.
Arche simply sat there, saying nothing. His eyes blank and wide open. He wasn't even sure if he was breathing, nor did he care. There was a light, high-pitched hissing sound in his ears. He was lost in his own mind, regaining at least some of his missing memories. The mysterious white figure he had seen was actually Phi. Because he couldn't remember her, she was replaced by it. The floating aspect was just a haunting misinterpretation.
"Arche? What, have you gone deaf? What's up with you?" Phi said when Arche turned to look at her.
"...Phi... Phi," He said deadpan-like. "You... I saved you."
She stared at him in disbelief and slowly leaned back against the wall. "So, you finally remembered what happened."
Arche nodded very loosely, still in a haze. "I saved you... but I couldn't save Luna."
The entire room grew silent. She stared at the ground, while Arche sat in the chair, still as can be. What could possibly be said at this moment? Their connection that was swallowed in darkness had slowly began to bear light, but what remains at the end of the tunnel may not be as bright as he'd hope.
(For reference, I brought up the white figure in the dream sequence:
[spoiler]
That is, until he heard a single, child-like voice saying "Is... is Luna really..." The child couldn't finish her sentence. Archetype looked over at the voice beside him. Startled, he quickly jumped and backed away a few inches from the child.
He spoke, with his voice shaking a bit, "Who are you?" What he saw distracted him from the fire just a few feet away from him. A mysterious white figure in the shape of a small child. There were no identifying features like a face, hair, nails or even skin. Even the gender was a mystery. The figure was completely white, with literally nothing else to describe. Well, nothing else except the voice, which sounded like a young girl.
The figure said nothing else and suddenly ran off until it disappeared from his vision.
[/spoiler]
Yay, foreshadowing.
)