Outlaw.
Not an unfamiliar term to me. After all, despite my assumed role of treasure hunter, outlaw is what I had just as often been.
Despite Werner's best efforts I still... knew little of the world. At first, I merely survived. Alone. Yet I didn't recognize the loneliness, as I had known very little else in my life – not having memories will do that to you, I guess.
So, at first, I robbed. I killed. I'm sure that despite my best efforts to try to at least be humane, I killed more than a few innocent people in my nearly animalistic need to survive. I thought of little else then. And, by the time I realized that what I was doing was wrong, there was already a price on my head. I moved on with all due haste, with no hesitation, as I had no attachments to people and a land I didn't know. I denied the logic that I shouldn't be attached to life either, for the same reasons, and decided that simply living was about all that I could do.
So I became, without knowing that I was even doing it, a drifter. A lone wolf, one who had no need for others. Happy in my own little world, my own little thought, I cared little for those who spoke to me. The thoughts of others were merely an intrusion into my own, and I had no time for the needs of others. After all, what did they know of me? Why should anyone care at all about the nameless drifter without a past or a future? Interaction seemed pointless, and thus, I avoided it at all costs. For years, I was alone – and I liked it that way, no regrets at all.
Nope, I don't need anyone else, never did. I'm better off on my own, not being a burden to anyone, and more importantly, not being burdened by others. I'll just live and live and eventually, one day, I'll end up dead in a ditch or pecked at by vultures, and not a soul will notice the difference. My life is anonymity, and no one will ever know my name or my thoughts, who or what I am.
A perfect life of non-existence.
And as I lay here, an outlaw once again, despised and hunted by the very people who's world I just saved, I glance around me, at the night sky, at the fire and the stones and that strange purple lizard that's been looking at me funny for the past hour. And I glance at the sleeping faces around me. Strong and square, darkly tanned, framed by hair a shade darker with a wisp of cloud at the front. Narrow, yet wise and with a presence unbecoming such a man, dark green hair, and eyes usually framed by glasses, shut gently in their first peaceful respite in nearly a week. And then... her, her strong, beautiful, handsome face, determined even in sorrow, with chestnut locks and those funny sweeping bangs that I never tire of seeing, no matter how ridiculous they may seem.
And as I glance around at this, I notice one more thing, something seen but not seen. That I – I, and the entire premise my lifestyle was fixated upon – was wrong.
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Whaddya think? First fic in four bloody years, I just had to get... I dunno... something out of my system, so I thought for about, I dunno, twenty seconds and got this. Review if it really matters.