Memory Shares

[voidtreckermods]

An archive of the memories used in the Healing Waters Event.

Please note the content warnings at the top of each set of memories!

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Inigo | Jelle

[voidtreckermods]

Warnings: battle, aftermath of battle, blood, undead
Themes: family, repressed emotions, dealing with war

Memory One With the sun setting at the horizon at the end of a long day, you are wandering away from what seems like the obvious scene of a battlefield, judging by the scorchmarks left behind in the grass by magic and broken weapons lying discarded in the field. You are walking with some slight difficulty, the tiniest hint of a limp, as you rub your leg and mumble, "Ow! This one's pretty bad. I can't go back to camp like this..."

A man approaches you- not too much older than you, but it's clear that you're related. The man puts a hand on your shoulder. "Something wrong, Inigo? Everyone else has already headed back."

Your jaw drops, momentarily overtaken by surprise, before you quickly try to smile. "F-Father?! Er, I just... thought I saw a cute milkmaid at the edge of the battlefield!"

"... You're a worse liar than your mother. It's obvious your leg is wounded." The man frowns, reaching out to touch the leg you are rubbing.

You shriek in pain. "It's fine, it's—GYAAAH! Ow! Ow, ow ow! No, don't touch it! Don't touch it!"

The frown on the man's face lingers, though his gaze shifts up from your leg to your face. "This is a serious injury, Inigo! Why didn't you say something?"

"What, and ruin my reputation?" You bite your tongue, trying to shove the pain down far enough to be able to smile. "The ladies want Inigo the Invincible."

Suddenly the man pulls his hands away, taking a step back, the frown growing even more intense.

"Gods, ENOUGH, Inigo!"

"... Father?" The smile instantly fades off your face. There's something like a lost child about you facial expression - which is very much what you feel like right now in the face of the volume of your father's voice rising.

"You can barely walk, and you're still thinking about girls?! Be serious for once! Really, why did you travel back from the future? Lucina fights so hard, but you... Honestly, I'm disappointed. You have no idea what it means to be at war."

For a moment you can't say anything. You just feel the light breeze drifting through your hair and the stinging pain of the wound on your leg as an awkward silence lingers. It would be so easy to just dismiss all this, play it off, make a joke, but before you can do any of that, different words flow out of your mouth: "You don't know a damned thing! You're the one who's clueless, Father!"

Now it's the other man looking speechless in the face of the outburst.

"Do you think I'd be out here if I were ONLY after girls? Out here fighting every day, wondering if this is the time I don't make it home?!"

Your father says something, but in yoir memory it's unintelligible, fading into the background compared to the feeling creeping under your skin, making you continue.

"You may think me a dandy and a fool, but a lot of people depended on me in the future. Every day, I was out there fighting Risen and risking my life. With everyone looking to me to be strong, I had no choice. I HAD to be invincible. I couldn't complain or show any weakness. Not with everyone else struggling in that damn war-torn wasteland... Even with you and Mother gone, I had to pretend I was fine. That I wasn't hurting. I had to fight every day of my sorry life and wear a smile while I did it!" You stop for a moment, choking up, but then you continue.

"You said I looked like I didn't have a care in the world? Well, I'm sorry to tell you, but that's not the case at all. I smile and joke around because I don't want to show the world any weakness... If that disappoints you... then I guess you just have to be disappointed."

Your father opens his mouth, but you shake your head. You don't want to hear it. Even though you said your father would just have to be disappointed in you, and surely he is.. You still don't want to hear it even more and further break your heart.

So you turn away before anything else. "That said, I do appreciate the concern.. I'll get the leg looked at." Before the other can get a word in, you are already walking away. You don't want to hear it. You know you won't be able to stop yourself from crying if you hear even further how much of a disappointment you are.

Memory Two You are running through a field of flowers, giant flowers in a giant field, because you can't be much older than four years old. From your height you don't quite look down on the flowers as much as most adults would - instead you stand among them, almost as one of them with your deep dark blue hair.

Or, well, there's not much standing about it. You run back and forth, jogging yet another slight distance as you spot a particularly interesting or pretty flower in the distance. In the background you can spot the palace where you live, but you have absolutely no interest in it. You are much too distracted by the rainbow of colours and all the interesting scents you're surrounded by.

A voice calls out to you, soft but bright, enough to make the your head turn. You looks to see the source of the noise - a woman with long, pink hair like cotton candy, and a wonderfully sweet smile on her face.

Your face lights up.

"Mommy!" Instantly you forget all the flowers. Instead you start running directly in the woman's direction - though right before you reache her, you manage to trip over your own feet, landing face-first in the flowers and the dirt. You let out a surprised yelp as you fall, but once you are lying on the ground, there's only a soft "ow."

The woman takes a few quick worried steps towards you, dropping herself to a squatting position and gently lifting you back up on both feet. Your eyes are watery, the first hint of tears, though they don't quite spill as the woman smiles at you.

"Sweetie, did you hurt yourself? Are you okay?"

You stare for a moment, a slight pout on your face. Thinking, but then you slowly nods. "Uh-huh. But.. I'll be okay.."

There's something slightly reluctant about the tone, but the woman just smiles and ruffles your hair slightly.

"You're such a big boy already, Inigo. Even though you're too cute for this world." She leans back on her heels. "Now, why don't we do something to cheer you up? Would you like to dance?"

The mention of that makes the your eyes light up instantly. You nod eagerly, and it makes the woman giggle as she stands up. Even though there's no music, she starts dancing on the spot between the flowers. It's as if her movements don't even need music - they just happen naturally, gracefully. Her long pink hair trails behind her as she moves her legs and arms.

And though you are still so young and clearly haven't developed a fine sense of motoric skills yet, you move right along, trying to copy her every move as the two of you dance among the flowers with smiles on their faces.

Memory Three Inigo's heels dig deeper into the dirt as another body falls to the ground after a swing from his sword. The sky overhead is dark, but cloudy - not a single star in sight. How long has he already been fighting today? At some point the day had changed into night without him doing as much as noticing it. There's no time for it. Not when their enemies just keep coming and coming, over and over, infinite waves of them. Every single time it feels like he's cut down the last few, more pop up.

His body aches. He's tired, but he keeps moving, almost automatically. Because he knows there's no choice. It's either force himself to keep going or die. Or worse - let his friends die. He can hear them fighting just as much as him, swords and lances and axes clashing, arrows flying across the battlefield, the telltale sounds of magic being flung around.

Inigo swings his sword. Left, right, two more bodies fall to the ground. Despite the fact that his enemies look human, they don't say a thing. They just mindlessly and quietly attack, at best letting out nothing more than a wordless roar. Their skin is already unnaturally pale, the look in their eyes empty. Like there's no soul left in there.

After what feels like an eternity the waves finally start slowing down. Less and less of the Risen show up, though the ground is now littered with bodies everywhere, making Inigo have to make sure to watch out where he's moving as he fights so he won't trip over them.

The last remaining Risen stands in front of him, a man only slightly older than him holding an axe. Inigo pulls back his sword and plunges it straight through his heart.

But he doesn't go down like the others. Not instantly. The look in the eyes of the Risen - the man - changes, some actual emotion slipping in, some soul, as the man smiles and faintly manages to mumble "Thank you" before collapsing to the ground.

Inigo freezes. The night air suddenly feels so much colder. Don't think about it, he tells himself. Don't think about it, don't think about it, don't think about it.

He pulls his sword out of the corpse with a sickening sound and turns to walk. Someone calls out to him, one of his friends, looking as tired as Inigo feels his very bones are right now, asking him if he needs some healing from Brady. Inigo forces a smile on his face and shakes his head, saying he's fine, even though he can feel an open wound stinging at the back of his shoulders. Inigo tells him to check up on Nah first, he's pretty sure she got hurt pretty bad this time around-- and while the guy's back is turned, he quietly slips away, over to the nearby river.

He dips his sword into the water, attempting to rinse off all of the blood. Then he tugs off his shirt - the wound underneath stinging only more now it's exposed to the air - and holds it into the river. It's so red that its original colour only starts to appear as some of the blood washes out, though there are a few spots that he just can't seem to get rid of, no matter how much he tries to rub them out.

He thinks of the man whose eyes returned back to normal, who thanked him, and starts rubbing even more furiously. Tears appear in his eyes. Why won't the blood come out? Why won't it--

Without realising it, he's leaned forwards enough to catch a glimpse of himself in the water. Dirt and blood are smeared in streaks on his face, his hair so matted in blood that the usual dark blue has started to turn purple. Reflexively, as if burned by the sight, Inigo raises his hands up to his hair, trying to wipe out the blood. But considering his hands are covered in blood as well, it only makes worse of a mess. His arms feel so tired and heavy, but he keeps pushing himself, moving them more-- he has to get it out.

It won't come out.