A Self-Study Within A Broken Mind

I came back at lunch time, getting lost in the written pages from before, this time centralizing upon the time Lila told me about who she really was. Thirty minutes passed without my notice of just reading back what I noted down before. It was shortly after I tried to erase my connection to the box left behind by Rebecca, becoming a baby that Lila had to care for. It was likely before Kara showed up again, before Fyntn, and before Tarne was exposed as Akier. While being much more annoying back then, it was much simpler than having to convince someone to erase a memory from their mind. I stepped into the room where the three lay sleeping. Rather than ask for Fyntn to stop by again, I picked up the Keir from the floor and called forth the AI James Denizen. He appeared out of a gray shimmer, gaining color by the second until he looked solid. When I passed my hand through him, he phased out to the colors and a ghost-like figure underneath at the entrance point. “Hey, James,” I said. “Kara ...

I came back the next day without hesitation. Part of me forgot about the memory inside Tarne’s mind, but when I entered the library, it all came rolling back with an impact. I could not leave now that Lila saw me. She sat on the third to lowest stair alone. “Hey,” I said. She did not look up from her dejected pose. I half expected her to ash a stress copy right then and there. “How’s Tarne?” “Is she even Tarne anymore?” Lila murmured almost inaudible. If there had been any other sound around us right now, I would not have been able to discern the words. “Will she ever be the same person?” Lila’s eyes watered while looking up at me. “Of course she will be,” I consoled blindly. “I don’t know, Jack,” she said. “Akier seems to have a very strong reason to latch onto her. He can’t face what he did to his own daughter, so now pretends that Tarne is Gemmy. How do you even tear apart that delusion? Wouldn’t that just make him a billion times madder if we make him face the truth? Just try to im...