Misha and Her Memoria [FINAL]

At least, that’s what I said, but…

Misha found herself sitting on her bed, doing absolutely nothing.

I think I got too caught up in the heat of the moment, and now I’m about to do something pretty scary sounding. Why did I have to say all that?!

She twisted and turned, burying her face into her pillows.

…No, I’m not taking any of that back. Something’s been irking me about the way that it feels like everybody’s hiding things from me. I get the feeling that Misha must’ve been pretty sheltered. How old is she, anyways?

She turned until she was on her back, long strands of her hair running down her cheeks.

The only way I’m going to be able to get anything out of them is if they start taking me seriously. I could tell that Rheed and Labrysta were pretty shocked when I started yelling at them like that, so maybe if I can show them I can be independent, they’ll be more inclined to share some more about what they’ve got going on behind the scenes. The bottom line is that I need to start taking back control. Though, if I’m being completely honest…

Where am I even supposed to begin?!

The walls of her room hummed---the Sanctorium must’ve been on the move. With the way her bed was rumbling, it almost felt like a massage chair, ripping and tearing away at all that stress that was beginning to build up in her shoulders. After her impromptu declaration, Rheed said that it’d take a few days to reach their destination, so there was still some downtime for Misha to kill.

That said, she spent most of the last five or some days lounging about in her room while the others were busy doing who knew what. Sometimes Rheed would come in to have idle conversation with her, but anytime she tried probing deeper into what it is they were actually doing, he kept dodging her questions. However, she did find out a little more about the structure of the Sanctoriums, and along with it, more about her brother himself.

The Sanctoriums were split between three sections: the Legs which moved it; the Body upon which the people live upon; and the Head of operations, split between the archivia and the helm. As she expected, he was the leader for this “Society #37,” spending most of his time at the helm to chart out a course to places that they haven’t been before. Labrysta was his aide and the archivist in charge of keeping the archivia safe, so seeing her outside of it was a rarity.

I guess for now, I want to get to where Arven is. If I knew how everything would’ve turned out, I would’ve just stayed and asked him all of my questions! Then again, some of that was kinda my fault…

Misha tried to get off the side of her bed, but the moment her feet touched the ground and her hands left the sheets, she immediately fell back to catch herself.

…No, no way. I’m gonna go crazy if I start trying to walk around without any landmarks. I don’t even know what my room looks like.

Her fists clenched.

Dammit, okay! I think I know where the door is. It’s made out of wood, right? If I can just reach that…

With a burst of energy, she threw herself forward, preparing to brace herself. She managed to pull her arms up just in time before she bumped into something with several rough ridges running along its surface. Feeling around for any sort of hinge or knob, she found purchase on what felt like a metal hinge on her right, pulled it down, and lo and behold came the creeeeeak.

Yes! Okay, just keep to the walls, and everything will be fine!

But the moment she stepped outside, she froze.

We took a turn out of my room… Which way was it again? Actually, right is always right, isn’t it? Let’s go right!

Hugging the wall to her right, she began shuffling alongside it, metallic in nature and cold to the touch. She silently cheered at the idea that she was beginning to make some progress, but it wasn’t long until she eventually ran out of wall.

C-Crap! I’m completely in the dark! O-Okay, stay still, there’s still something I can do…

Just then, she noticed a set of small footsteps coming her way. They were muted and barely there, almost like a cat with its pudgy paws, but she was sure that she knew the color of that sound…

“Kiria? Is that you?”

“...So it is,” she responded after a brief silence. “What are you doing outside of your room?”

“I’m, uh, doing a little bit of exploring,” Misha coughed. “Why are you here? I don’t think there’s anything this way, at least…”

“The way past your room leads to the observation deck. I was told by your brother to keep watch closer to the ground,” she said.

Come to think of it, Kiria is a pretty straightforward person. Maybe this is my chance.

“Oh, could you take me with you? It’s been awhile since I’ve been there. I like feeling the wind in my hair while the Sanctorium’s moving,” Misha beamed. “Plus, I really wanna talk to you!”

“Is that so?” Kiria sounded a little hesitant. “Walk with me, if that is your wish. But I will not hold your hand.”

“H-Huh?”

“You declared it as such in the archivia, did you not? I trust that your resolve isn’t so flimsy.”

As Kiria began to walk away, Misha was about to say something, but the words died in her throat. She’d admittedly gotten used to having somebody’s hand to hold whenever she was walking around, so to suddenly have the training wheels pulled out from underneath her was extremely jarring. Even so, she didn’t dare to turn away.

I don’t have my eyes, but I have everything else, don’t I? If I focus on the image in my mind… if I can hear it, there are those bright colors on the canvas.

With each quiet footstep that Kiria took, a flash of her palette echoed in Misha’s head. While initially they looked murky and faded, they grew deeper, blending together into a mesh of brilliance that swirled itself into a coil of thoughts---crimson, marigold, plum, and brown. There was no way she would remember such a strange array of colors, yet there they were before her, slowly making their way down the hallway.

“Hold on, I’m coming!”

Like a newborn chick fresh out of an egg she tried chasing after the lights, only to trip over her own legs and stumble to the ground.

It hurts, but what hurts more…

She pushed herself back onto her feet, stumbling a few more steps before falling flat on her face.

…is being left in the dark by people who keep pitying me.

The next time she got up, she felt more stable on the ground. Instead of rushing ahead, she took one careful step at a time, trying her best to keep pace with the shades in front of her. By the time she caught up, she could feel a breezy draft lifting her hair aloft.

Since when did I start feeling this way? I don’t… remember.

She made it.

Of course, a battlefield was nothing compared to a straight hallway, but it was a start. And a start was everything she could hope for.

“You did remarkably well for one who I thought was full of hot air,” Kiria took her by the hand, guiding her up a few steps while the winds blew past the two.

“Huh? I thought you weren’t going to take my hand.”

“If you were to make one wrong step around here, you would fall to your death. That is a risk I’m not willing to take,” Kiria said flatly, but she did have a point, Misha thought to herself.

Her words are cold, but her hands are so warm.

“Thank you again,” Misha muttered, “for saving me from the caverns, I mean. I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for you.”

“Think nothing of it,” Kiria stopped walking, letting go of Misha’s hand. “You do realize why I referred to you in such a manner back then, yes?”

“...Of course I do. It’s because I can’t see, right?”

“Not only that, but it’s because if we must place our lives on the line to save yours, then the situation will become all the more complicated,” she added. “Your brother is a haphazard sort. I see that he has good intentions, but his way of executing them is… flawed. I imagine his decision to bring you along was also a charge against his better judgement.”

It’s weird how I know less about my “brother” than I do about the others on this Sanctorium. You’d think siblings could share anything and everything together, but I don’t think I’ve had a single chance to really get to know him yet.

“Do you think he’s not telling me everything? Things that I really should know about, I mean---important things.”

“I would venture to say that you know nothing at all,” Kiria muttered. “Truth be told, I envy the world that you see. I’m sure it must be as beautiful as you imagine it to be.”

What? What is there to be so envious about? The world that I “see” is nothing at all.

“And ‘nothing’ may be better than to see ‘something.’”

Oh, crap!

“Did I say that out loud?”

“Yes,” Kiria said. “There are many I know who would love to close their eyes as soon as they’re opened. Their sight becomes their ears, and it becomes the only way they know how to perceive the world. Once it becomes too much, they cover their ears and wish to forget all the things that they have heard. That is the world that we live in.”

A moment’s pause.

I don’t get it…

“Hm?”

“Those people you’re describing… how could they give up so easily? Do you know how hard it’s been trying to live like this?” Misha’s voice cracked.

Whenever Rheed wasn’t there to talk to her, the girl took the time to flip through Misha’s life like pages of a book, considering that her memories were restored by the archivia. Every single one of them was colored in with its own special hue, like a canvas dripping from edge to edge with the paint of her emotions. All the sights that she captured she stored in a library, or rather her image of one. Even if she spent most of her time alone---even if she knew her brother never told her any truths---none of that sadness and loneliness ever bled through, and she kept on dreaming for a day where she could really, truly see what her friends and the world looked like.

“She’s---... I’ve really been trying, you know,” Misha clenched her fists. “There are some people who wouldn’t care if the world looked like shit. Sometimes, they just want to see it and remember it for what it is instead of hearing all of these fairytales! How… How could they treat their life like it's all meant to be forgotten?”

“Things keep slipping through my hands and there’s nothing I can do about it. All of you might look at me like I’m some sort of piteous, useless thing whose only purpose is to be protected, but what are you protecting me from?!”

I never asked to be in this girl’s body…

I never asked to have my memories be so fickle that they fade the moment I stop thinking about them…

I never asked to be “protected” like this…

I never asked for any of this!

Her mind felt like it was running at a million miles per hour, and it couldn’t stop no matter how much she tried. Visages of the past flit about at lightning speeds, meshing and mixing together in a chaotic rhythm that made her want to scream and cry her heart out, the desire to want to know incinerating the very core of her being---

And on one sunny day underneath the dilapidated roof of the old gymnasium, she remembered her reason why.