:::
*Extras*

Untold Tales 2

"Cordelia, are you ok?" Sumia was concerned for her dear friend.
"No. I nearly fell off the school."
"We meant Krom." Ronqu was concerned for his not-his-wife-at-the-moment.
"He actually took my lunch gift ..."

Both sat down with Cordelia to look at the sky. Sumia told Ronqu not to tell Cordelia anything about Dream Lucina's destructive glomp.
"Hey Cordelia ... how is your heart? " Sumia asked.
"Pounding," Ronqu's hand was on Cordelia.

(!)

Cordelia was beet red and Ronqu quickly took his hand away, but they realized something was wrong when Cordelia asked: "Is it me or is it because we're in the Dream World that my memory and emotions are a bit out of whack?"

"What do you mean?"

"This is Stella's dream, right? Reality for some reason a bit hazy for me ..."

Both Sumia and Ronqu's hands were on Cordelia's forehead.
"No fever. Go on."
"You know about my ... crush with Krom. This is the first time I didn't pass out."
(Immediately)

"But for reason, I feel like I'm having feelings for something else."
(Something else?)

"Do you remember what your life is like in our reality?" Ronqu earnestly asked Cordelia.
"... I ... I ... don't know."
Sumia and Ronqu stared at each other.

(Her memory has been affected since coming here?)
(Everyone else seems fine ... and they all know who their spouses are even though the story has us all being single.)
(STELLA! What did you do to her?)

"You were beet red, when Ronqu felt your heart." (!)

Cordelia looked at Ronqu, but he saw the Cordelia he loves wasn't there.

"I read somewhere even if you forget, your body remembers," commented a new voice.

Maribelle, Sully, and Olivia were looking at the three and decided to come over, only to hear about Cordelia being unwell.
All five sat down in earnest with Cordelia.
"All of you remember our reality?"

::

"It seems like you need to rediscover your heart," Maribelle replied after scrutinizing Cordelia from head to toe.
"That the ... something you care for is actually very close to you," Olivia cheerfully added.
"Better than Krom a bazillion times," Sully gruffly concluded.
"Really ... ? Why is my head so blank about this?"
"GROUP HUDDLE!"

(It seems like she still has Krom in her heart.)
(At the most, a sliver of it is lingering.)
(Hey Le Hubby and Le Wai-fu, any opinion?)

Ronqu and Sumia took another look at the currently confused Cordelia.
Their feelings were mixed. Her friend and his wife still had a crush on her husband. Both wanted Cordelia to be happy but they wanted their Cordelia back.

(I want her to say how she truly feels. Be frank about her emotions ... even if it's something from the bottom of her heart that she knows I wouldn't want to know ...)
( ... Get her to confess to Krom and get this over with.)
The group suddenly hears Krom's voice saying: "So now I would like to declare us as a couple!"

(What?)
The six look around the corner to see the fiasco. The 3 ex-girlfriends and actual wife were exasperated and stormed off to demand an answer to only promptly return in disgust of what happened.

"Hey, do you know who jumped after you when you fell? No, it was not Krom. Try and remember who it was. I know you remembered that you fell."
The girls gathered all the Shepherds together minus Krom, who was shooed off.

::

"Everybody we are doing a little matchmaking guessing session for Cordelia. Cordelia, you will have identify first who the person is, who they describe is their spouse in our reality and if they are married in the first place, as there are five individuals here who are not married. Everyone, Cordelia's memory is a bit on the fritz since arriving here. She needs our help, in particular, about who saved her from falling off the school building 10 minutes ago."
Everyone looked at Ronqu and Cordelia - Selena was surprised and worried to hear such a thing was happening to her mom.

Cordelia identified the first generation female Shepherds fine, but was a bit stumped on the future children especially her own daughter.
"Mommy, you're kidding me are you? WAH!" Selena was crying in Azure's arms.
That sob somehow clicked in her brain, but Cordelia couldn't understand why.

"I'm your mom? But we're almost the same age!?"
(I don't think she remembers the war either.)

"I do care that you have forgotten me but please most importantly don't tell me you forgot about dad."
"D-ad?"
"Move along. She gave you a big fat clue about what you actually care for." Sully escorted Selena and Azure out.
"Now to the men. By the looks of it, the sons can be excluded."

Cordelia identified all the first generation male Shepherds fine as well, but couldn't connect who their wives are. Everyone saw that Ronqu's presence was not clicking with her, while the least obvious guy's presence did.

"HINT: Do you remember the phobias of all the men? I think you need the roster at this rate."

All the men went red.

Krom was informed what had happened and finally was allowed in.

"Cordelia, your memory can't be completely gone, can it?"

She gave a really agonized look to Krom.

"I want to say "I ... love" ... but ... I ... said that "I love" to someone else, didn't I? I want to say I have gaps in my memory. The more I try to remember, it feels like I do have something in those gaps but they are locked up for some reason ..."

Krom kneels down to Cordelia.

"I promise we are always friends even to the end but Sumia ... told me everything ... *pauses* Your heart actually belongs to someone special here. ... I'm sorry. Cordelia, you've been so good to me all this time but all I did was making you sad. I don't deserve to be in the presence of someone special as you. Your special guy is your true love."

Everyone looked at Cordelia who was quiet.

" ... I need some air. Excuse me."

Ronqu and Selena, worried, took off after her. Everyone went with them to search.

Krom and Sumia stayed to have face to face talk. After a long silence, Krom expresses his feelings.
" Hey Sumia, thanks for telling me about Cordelia. Your care for your friends is what I love about you ... I know the current me made our friend sad because my love is for you but I do wish for her and Ronqu's happiness."

Sumia burst into tears and embraced Krom, "I do too, I do too..."

::

"Does anyone know why her memory is gone though?"

"I can answer that."

Everybody turned to see "Stella" was here.

"Our mistress wanted Cordelia to confess her feelings honestly and innocently to everyone, in particular, Ronqu. Ronqu had confided in milady a long time ago about Cordelia's feelings. So when you all entered into this world, Stella sealed her memory, until Cordelia ... and Ronqu fess up to each other."

::

The search party looked all over campus for Cordelia, but couldn't find her.

"Dad, no sign of mom still?"
"No..." Everyone was getting worried. Ronqu was panicking.

"Any ideas? We are in a foreign place ... "

Ronqu and Selena were in deep thought.

"Are there high places in this area? ... She sucks at running so that's why she became a pegasus knight and learned to love the sky." (Selena:?!)

"Pegasi don't exist here ... Only those ... 'airplanes' fly in this sky."

"If you say that's the case, did you go look in Campus Main Office Building? It's huge and tall, especially the clock and bell towers and ... because she is the student council president, (?! She is the student council president?) she has access to that building after school hours."

"We better find her quick, we're leaving tonight for the castle."

"Mom ... Where are you?"

::

The night was settling in and at the clock tower of the campus office, Ronqu, after a million break-in attempts, finds Cordelia looking over the city nightscape.

He had brought a poncho and wore her and himself into it.

" I'm sorry ... it's my fault you are like this here." Ronqu continued his confession and when he ended: "Do you remember? My name is Ronqu."
Ronqu gently looked at the dazed Cordelia, but all he got was silence. After a while, a quiet voice spoke.

"And ... my name ... is ... Cordelia ... ...that we promised to be together ... until death do we part ..."

"Cordel?"

" ... You ... Dolt! Sniff!" Cordelia buried herself in deeper into the poncho to Ronqu's hug to cry and whack him.

"I'm sorry, Cordel."

She eventually calms down enough to talk to him. "I started to vaguely recall what your phobia was and your care for me today. It contradicted in my memory about you ... and what someone told me about you and that little girl who died from your youth. (!) My heart was pounding for you ... I remember now that when I fell, a strong hand came for me and held me close. My mind registered nothing but that feeling, my body knew it was from you. I missed you, Ronqu."

"Thank you Cordel for coming back. Thank you."

:::

:Note - To be honest I do like Cordelia. So I wanted make a little story for her. Maribelle is a fave too, but I just couldn't think of any decent side story for her ... Sigh: