Homesick (noun)
(adj. homesickness)
An acute sadness or longing for one's home and family caused by a period of separation

Homesickness had a tendency to strike when he least expected it. And it had a tendency to strike hard.
One moment he would be fine, his mind on the present moment, happy as can be, and the next his gut would clench up with nausea, his eyes cloud with unshed tears, his throat tightening and breathing becoming difficult and all he would be able to think would be Home. Home. Home. I want to go home.

Sometimes he could identify the things which set if off, but that rarely did any good. So few of them were things he could ever hope to do anything about, to control.
He couldn't control if there were smells wafting down the street or hanging in the empty air of buildings that reminded him of home

(Sometimes bacon and eggs and for half a second he's in the Knife and Spork. Sometimes the musty smell of old books and he's in Warlic's office. Sometimes... sometimes something, some combination of something metallic, something watery, something cold, that resembles but never quite matches an indescribable scent that makes him think for just a moment he could look to the side and out of a window and see the vast expanse of space stretching out before him.
Those times are the worst of the lot)

or if someone had a stutter and his name came out just a little bit different, sounding like a name he hasn't heard in oh so many years

(It never is though. It never is the name he thinks he might have heard, because the only one that remembers that name now is him)

Or if, just out of the corner of his eye, he sees dark skin and blond hair and maybe even a red scarf, making his heart skip a beat and his legs stop for a moment so that he can check if he just walked past a mirror.

(He never has)

He couldn't control if he heard a voice that sounded achingly familiar but turned out to be someone else.

(and it's always someone else. Always. Some days he wonders if he'll ever find the friends he hasn't found yet, wonders if he missed his chance to find them long ago)

It was rare that he knew what caused it, though. Rare that he could pinpoint what it was around him making homesickness well up.

He had his ways of handling it. Closing up the shop for the day. Locking himself in his room in the tower. Sometimes the room alone could help. He had a lot of things in there that were either salvaged from some of the things that survived the Reset, or were replicas as close as he could match them.

There's an energy blade rack in the corner, but not a single one of the blades is a survivor of the Reset. He made them all himself, and they're not even close to as good as the real thing.

(He's a weaponsmith now, certainly, and he's good at it. But these are replicas from a fading memory and he wasn't an energy blade engineer back then. He was a pilot, a mechanic sometimes if needed. Give him a mecha, a starship, he could work with those. Energy blades were a different story.

Sometimes he wishes he'd taken Energy Blade Engineering back when he was a student. He'd probably have learned some stuff that would be useful now)

But, good as the real thing or not, they are the closest thing to those weapons of old that he has. And sometimes he'd use them, keep his skills sharp, for all that he's pretty much a non-combatant these days. It felt a dishonour to the memory of those that taught him how to wield an energy blade in the first place to let himself forget it now that he's the only one that remembers.

(He does have a real energy blade. Just one, locked in a small box hidden under his bed. It's not his blade, he never uses it. He had always planned to return it to its rightful owner when he met them again, but they had been so different...
...he hopes one day he'll have the courage to give it back, even if they won't know that that is what he's doing)

So. Homesickness. He knows it, he's dealt with it often enough, but something about this time feels different somehow.

There's a stinging behind his eyes, a swirling in his gut, a tightness in his throat. And this time, he knows without a shadow of a doubt exactly what brought it on.

"...Cysero?" the hero sounds uncertain and concerned. He can't blame them – he's pretty sure that he's been standing stock still and expressionless for at least a few minutes. It's not the sort of response you expect, passing on a message like that.

"Thank you," the words leave his mouth before he even realises that he wants to say them and he can feel a massive smile splitting across his face. It almost feels like part of a weight has been lifted from his shoulders and gosh but his heart feels inexplicably lighter "Thank you, thank you, thank you. I...you...you have no idea how much hearing that...thank you,"

Words abruptly aren't enough. When words fail, you turn to action. At some point during his rambling thanks he had ended up holding onto the hero's hand with both of his but that isn't enough action to convey what he's trying to convey so he pulls them into a hug.

"Thank you, hero," he says again, totally unable to convey just how much what they passed on means. He wonders if there are even words to describe this depth of thanks.

And then he realises that he's still hugging them and yipes personal space, he's trying to show gratitude, not make them uncomfortable, so he pulls away.

"I didn't do anything special," the hero insists, looking somewhat embarrassed. "I just passed along a message,"

He shakes his head, grin feeling like it's going to be permanently plastered there forever, still unable to find words for his sheer gratitude. It's rather amazing how much three small words can do, but, well, a message like that after five thousand years of thinking you were alone? Maybe someone, somewhere, could come up with the words to describe that, but right here, right now, he can't.
So he shows it in his actions instead, opening his arms in a suggestion and the hero looks like they want to roll their eyes but open their own arms in an indication that it's okay.

He all but whoops as he scoops them up in another hug, spinning them around with unrestrained glee and if the laughter he can hear is any indication, they don't mind it.

Throughout it all, three words have echoed through his head.

Kordana says hello.

Honestly, I've always wanted to see Kordana's message passed on. So I wrote a fic to make it happen. Part two is already written and should be up here later today (or maybe tomorrow)