It was always in his dreams, now, when he saw her. Of course he'd been there, that day, after that chaotic climax, sitting quietly in wait, eyes fixed on the delicate gossamer formation resting atop that verdant font...but she'd remained silent. Then, and every time since.
His eyes pulled open as though against his will, shielded from the sunlight only by what thin strands of his hair still draped over his face - it had been quite some time since he'd had proper sleep, on a proper bed. Old force of habit tended to keep goading him on back to that old rundown manor, no matter what nightmares would follow him were he to return. It was something he'd only recently mustered the strength to counter.
Ah, but what time was it? He felt as though he'd slept for years.
His eyes slipped closed for a fleeting moment, and his heart leapt as such an ephemeral vision skimmed through his mind - oh, but he longed to speak with her, even once more. There was still something resting heavy on his mind, after all this time; still one thing that he'd been wholly unable to reconcile within himself...
His lips felt as if numb, silently forming her name but never sounding it aloud, gaze now glassy and unfixed upon the far wall as he lie, still sprawled comfortably in half-torpor and all but complete dress, upon the unmade bed.
She was haunting him.
He couldn't count how long he'd stayed there as such - there was no eternal ticking of a pendulum clock here, in such a modern city, as he'd been used to in that tiny, tormentuous room for so long. It was disturbingly comforting to simply let his mind run blank, devoid of neither thought nor question...
There was a sound outside the door, and he started as he snapped out of whatever dreamlike trance he'd been so immersed in, his gaze suddenly piercing and cold as it fixed stolidly upon the doorknob.
There was nothing but silence in the minutes that followed. A sigh left him.
He made himself to sit up piecemeal, movements slow and gradual - had it always been so difficult to awaken? He almost felt as if he'd been drugged. His cloak, still tightly adhered to his shoulders, clung about his arms and chest as though it were an extension of himself; he'd been too exhausted, the night prior, after such a long journey, to do much more than kick off his shoes before letting the bliss of sleep drag him down into its murky depths. It sounded so tempting again, now.
...why had she saved him, he wondered? Was it simply to prolong her continued apology, which still echoed through his mind on occasion? Was it because, as he himself had so insisted upon first waking, that she felt she needed to atone for something? Despite what actions she'd taken towards him, be they reactionary or intentional, he still felt as though there was still something more he could have done...still something that might have prevented what had ultimately happened three years prior. Always, it came back to him. His fault.
Somehow, he simply couldn't hold it in his mind to fault her. He wanted so direly for his thoughts to remain ignorant, for what had happened to him to have been the fault of a mad scientist who'd seen fit to play with him like some demented sort of plaything...
In truth, it really was both of their faults equally. Hers was just an accident, though, hadn't it been? Oh, but he longed to believe that she'd just...messed up while trying to save him, that she'd simply miscalculated something, or that her bastard superior had interfered...but even now, he couldn't entirely be certain. His dreams so tended to mingle everything together, and, most days, all he felt upon waking was renewed contempt for the man who had so wronged him over three decades ago, whether that was true reality or not.
He couldn't sort it all out. Part of his mind screamed to turn a blind eye, but the better part of him kept forcibly implying that it had been just as much the fault of she as the man he so despised.
...one of 'her experiments.' Wasn't that what that rogue scientist had called him, mere days ago? Was that all he'd truly been to her...?
Ah, but his thoughts were wandering, and that was dangerous, with him.
Closing that part of his mind away, painful as it was, he let another sigh pass his lips, one hand rising to resettle his hair. It would likely do him well to get out of bed, at least; perhaps making himself busy would keep these unsettling thoughts at bay.
He'd barely finished getting ready for the day when a knock sounded outside his door, and he flinched - he wasn't feeling terribly personable at the moment. Then again, when had he ever needed to make an excuse for what he had to say? Perhaps it was a good thing that his companions only half-revered, half-feared him. Or perhaps he was simply jaded.
"What is it?" The door swung open with a choked squeal, old and unoiled. He had to look down to meet the eyes of the girl who now stood quietly before him, expression placid, head tilted slightly to one side.
His full name, as she always addressed him, came out in quiet intonations, her voice nearly as deadpan as his own, and she looked slowly up at him after a moment of deliberation; "Will you take me back there with you, one day?"
"...what did you say?"
She winced, but it was only slight - perhaps his words sounded too distant, too uncaring, but could it really be helped when he had no idea what the girl before him, a mind far too cold and calculating belied by such a child's face, was intending? Oh, he knew just what her words meant, but why would she want to...?
Shifting her weight from foot to foot, the redhead bit her lip only momentarily, "Perhaps...perhaps now that I understand you, you might understand me when I apologize."
His eyes widened, remembering what she'd said to him so offhandedly via his PHS one time - memories, emotions, and dreams. Her name tumbled haphazardly from his lips in a harsh rasp, he falling slowly to his knees before the girl, expression almost pleading. His human hand reached shakily, tentatively out towards her shoulder, as though he feared she would shy away from him like so many before.
But she didn't. Instead, she clasped her much-smaller hands tightly around his own outstretched one, and...was that a smile trying to take the corners of her lips? "All she wanted...and, all I wanted, was your forgiveness."