I realized I haven't put up anything here for a while so I present a little V forVendetta fic I wrote a while back. Enjoy.
Memory is a slippery thing. One might only see a hazy blur when asked to recall something they did only a month ago but when asked about a time, a vague feeling that one got about a part of their life, reminiscence can be very clear. We remember those things that don't signify much except for a time when things were different somehow, we were younger and innocent maybe, or gaining the knowledge of one of life's little lies and discrepancies. Still, good or bad, we remember the things that no one else would. Fragments of the past that don't make a picture of anything anyone but the person remembering can decipher.
V remembers blueberry pancakes.
His mother used to make them on Sundays, her only day off from work. She would always manage the burn the first few but he had never known that until he'd gotten older since she would always eat them herself. He would always try to wake up early so he could watch his mother make the batter. To him it was making magic. She would take powders and potions and cook it to make something that tasted delicious. She would sometimes hum when mixing and making, incantations.
But she would always wake up before him, her body used to waking up too early for work. She'd tiptoe past the room he shared with his little sister and he would wake up to the smell of pancakes. Sophie would always waddle in a bit later, giving he time to try and pour the potion into the pan, using blueberries to make art in the gooey yellow canvas.
V doesn't remember his name, it's one of those things people loose. Like the colour of their favourite shoes or the texture of freshly dug up earth. He supposes it's not important, one name will do as good as another. But it's a mark of something at least, something that is so deeply implemented in the human psyche that they do not question it.
V remembers Larkhill.
The lines, the row of human life that was leaking around the edges. The daily, weekly, monthly injections. There were no yearly ones, few people made it up to one year. Some that did were too damaged to be of any further use. But he had survived it all, he still doesn't know why and at times he doesn't know if he should be grateful or remorseful. Oftentimes he's both.
He remembers the walking and waiting. Three straight lines that slowly got thinner until there was only need for two and then finally one. When that one line was formed they had been moved to the new cells, the survivors scattered all around Larkhill. He remembers the dull haze of drugs as he was shoved into his new 'home' as the guards laughingly called it.
The feel of the floor was different, it was slightly warmer and humid. Or maybe it was just the change in seasons, he couldn't tell how long he'd been chained here. There were birds outside, it surprised him that no matter how much change was happening in his world, no matter how much torture they put him through, the voice of a lark could still be sweet to him. It reminded him of his mother, hovering over her pancakes, purring softly as she made magic.
V remembers dancing.
Sophie used to dance. She would twirl unbalanced on her little toes, her brand new ballerina shoes shining with a dull rosy lustre. He remembers dropping her off to dance class, the kiss and the hug he received before she ran inside, her pink hair ribbons staring in a duet performance with her dark curls.
Her and the other little ballerinas in their first performance, they were so nervous, it was shown in their false smiles. But after, when she rushed out to meet him and their mother, then she shone, she asked if they had seen her and her twirls. As he watched her dance he realized that she too could make magic.
He remembers twirling with Evey as well, this was a different kind of magic he thought. Instead of wonder it filled him with something else, something liquid and white-hot, something he didn't quite recognize. It slithered from his grasp, hovering on the edge of his mind, refusing to accept any name he was willing to give.
He knows what it is now, but perhaps it's too late to wonder what could have happened and what should have happened. Should he be grateful that he at least knew her and loved her or resentful that he only found love at the moment when he couldn't fully enjoy it?
But he tries not to think of it, searing pain sets his body on fire, no matter how hard he tries to embody his ideals he is not bullet proof. And so he uses his last moments to remember, for there is much that he has tried to forget.
V remembers the fire.
The heat of the flames and the smell of burning flesh. The sound of tortured screams and taste of ash as it floated in the air. The world was lit up in an orange inferno and look how easily the torturers become the tortured. His liberation burned every inch of his body but he walked through the fire, he would not let it destroy him, the needles and the drugs and the mind numbing pain so extreme that it made every brush against the misty air that leaked from his window burn his skin, it all had tried to destroy him as well. This firestorm that surrounded him had nothing on that.
He was in hell, he knew that. And yet, there was something about escaping hell that made him crave it. Made him want to recreate it for those that he felt deserved it.
He stumbles in the cold underground, he will meet his enemies in hell soon enough. But in this game of remembrance he realized how much is lost to him. He has spent so long as V that he can't remember the other one, the person he was before all of this. It's like trying to look in a mirror, he can't see his reflection from this angle but he can see the bits of furniture that are scattered, he can just make out the outline of the things in the distance.
He can't remember why he had been black bagged in the first place. He had been barely out of his teenage years, his mother and sister had been dragged away from him. They asked him questions, told him that if he said he as wrong then they'd let him go. He was too young for this.
And the separation from his family, his still unoutgrown teenaged rebellion and the horror at being 'young', it let him refuse to repent. Or maybe it was just stupidity. Either way he was sent to Larkhill. The drugs they gave him had side effects, at times if he concentrated he could see objects a mile away as clear as if they were right in front of him. At first in only the left eye but gradually the right. And so when they had dragged the next batch of bodies to be thrown into the pit he practiced focusing and saw his mother.
She was no longer humming. But, he supposed, at least she was no longer screaming either.
And just as the world turns black he realises that remembering isn't about the enchantment of his childhood or the dizziness of his love. Remembering kept him from going completely mad in that cell, it fuelled the fear but kept it at bay as well, it lets him dance over and over and in his next life, if there is such a thing, he might still have that scrap of memory somewhere. Because he doesn't want to forget this life, for all the mistakes and cruelties that were inflicted upon him, he realizes that for nineteen years he had magic, for eight years he had dancing and for four months he had love.
He remembers the times, when he wasn't V. He remembers the people that made him a person instead of a symbol. And this is refuge for him. His memories of it saved his sanity almost as much as the actual events had.
He remembers being human.