III.

The cut had stopped bleeding overnight, leaving a red, angry scab that cracked easily. Demyx woke up feeling absolutely exhausted. For a while he watched the silvery-blue petals of his little plant sway in the faint breeze, utterly at a loss for what to do.

He was going to have to deal with this sometime.

What was he going to do now?

No more Organization. No more obligations. But instead of feeling freed, mostly he felt… dangerously untethered. If he had Arpeggio it would be a completely different story. With it, he could write and compose and experiment to his heart's content. But without it… he really wasn't much of anything.

The slickness of anxiety caught in his throat again, but he choked it off. No. He was not going to break down again. He'd just have to… find someone to bother, something to do. Anything to escape this feeling.

I hate being human.

Demyx decided to explore the castle. Maybe he would feel better if he had a more solid grip of his surroundings. The place was huge, after all. Some of it had to be interesting. He thought of it like a recon mission. Maybe something would help him figure out how to get out of here.

But then where would he go? Home?

The thought sent a pulse of pain through his head. Where… was home?

His memories were muddy and indistinct, more of the same blurry colors he'd seen recurring in his dreams. Only this time there other people, four or five of them, men and women in colorful robes and animal masks-

- legacy that sleeps within you-

He gasped and choked on spit.

I don't understand. I don't understand. I don't understand.

Why had Xemnas told them that, if only to go and die right afterwards?

He went to Even. In the lab, he was stooped over notes, flicking through brittle, yellowed pages every few seconds, his long blonde hair draping over the desk in front of him. Demyx knocked on the open door with his good hand.

"What do you want?" Even asked, barely looking up.

For a moment, Demyx nearly left. He didn't have to tell Even about this. But Even had more facts. Even could help him see more clearly. He was about to wonder if understanding was something he did want when Even caught sight of his bandaged palm.

"What did you do to yourself now?"

"Last night, at the dinner party. Cut myself when I was doing dishes."

Even stood and approached him. He unwrapped the purple cloth. "Right across your lifeline. Some cultures would consider that unlucky."

Demyx reached to take the cloth back, but Even held onto it.

"This thing's filthy. I might not have any magic, but I can at least provide adequate care." He opened a cabinet and pulled out a roll of cloth bandages and a jar of some sort of salve. He pulled on a rubber glove and rubbed the salve into the wound. It burned terrifically. Once the wound was cleaned and bandaged, Even turned away. "Well, if that's all you came for, would you do me a favor and leave me be? I'm in the middle of something important."

Demyx felt anger rising in him, but he quashed it down. "That's not why I came. Remember how you told me to keep track of my dreams?"

"My memory is very good."

"They weren't dreams at all. They were memories. But I don't think they were his." He exhaled. "They were mine."

Even didn't seem happy. "Oh. Is that all?"

He grit his teeth. And then he told Even about that day in the Keyblade graveyard, about Xemnas's bombshell.

Even was silent for several seconds. "Are you… quite sure?"

"Of course I'm sure!"

More silence. Demyx could heard the analog clock on the desk ticking softly.

"That was… from the time of fairy tales. Many, many years ago. I had believed that was all legend… but then… well, if the X-blade has been forged again, who knows what else might be true?" He crossed his arms. "Biologically speaking, you're barely in your twenties. If that were all true, then somehow you would be hundreds of years old."

Cold, existential sweat gathered under his arms.

"And if that were the case, then-how did you get here? And why?"

"I don't know." He thought he might be sick. "I barely remember… everything's gotten so fuzzy."

"I don't believe it," Even said. "It must've been some sort of ploy… something to give you neophytes purpose… then again…" He came close to Demyx, seized a handful of his hair, and pulled.

He yelped in pain. "Hey! What are you-"

Even took the few blond strands he'd harvested and put them in a small sample bag. "You've piqued my curiosity. Sit down. I need blood." He rummaged around in the cabinets and came back with a different box.

He hadn't heard anything more threatening. "What-"

Even seized Demyx's bad arm and rubbed a cold, wet prep pad against his elbow. "I need samples. I wonder if there's any dating technique that could tell us more about this situation."

"...Dating?" he asked.

"For your DNA," Even said, exasperated, as though it were obvious. "And to see how your other cells might have been impacted by whatever means of preservation that brought you to current day. That is, if any of this is true and not some lotus flower Xehanort was feeding you. There must have been something. This is your original body, yes? I think I'd have remembered making a replica for you."

"It better fucking be," Demyx said. He flinched when Even stuck him with a needle, but didn't fight it. As cunning and cruel Even could be, if he was interested he would do the utmost to figure it out. All Demyx had to do was comply.

He took six vials of blood in total, enough to make Demyx a bit woozy, considering he'd also lost a good amount last night. He took spit, nail clippings, cheek swabs, and some skin cells.

"I dearly hope this isn't a waste of my time," Even said. "But imagine the possibilities… and why you? Why not? I don't pretend to understand Xehanort. Not at all. It's an awful lot of effort for vessels he could have just made…" His voice grew softer and softer as he spoke to himself. "I've all I need. I let you know if there's more. You may go."

Dizzily, he went to the library. He knew the worlds had different time streams, but there was no way it had been hundreds of years since the first time he was human. Time streams were different, but not that different.

The library was so staggeringly full, each shelf crammed with more books than he could count, books in all different subjects; psychology, biology, chemistry, literature, multiple different languages, religion, theology, photography. The words started to blur together. He found the history section. Volumes and volumes about Radiant Garden, and some about a few other worlds that sounded familiar, but not much else. No lore. No legends.

"What is it that you're looking for in here?" Ienzo asked. He was passing by the same section, carrying several books.

"I was trying to find something about the age of fairy tales," Demyx said. "I want to know more about that time."

Ienzo looked confused. "That sort of thing is oral history," he said. "There are very, very few printed volumes that survive from that time. Ansem may be a collector of rare books, but even he could never get his hands on something like that. Why is it you ask?"

Demyx hesitated. He couldn't even be sure what Xemnas had told him wasn't a lie. Maybe he'd just completely made up those memories, or maybe they'd been planted when he was a vessel. He forced a laugh. "I was just bored, is all. Wanted to know more about what I just got myself out of."

Ienzo nodded slowly. "It's unfortunate, but a lot of history from that time is just… lost and shadowed in legend. Perhaps that's why Xehanort was trying to recreate the Keyblade war. Perhaps he wanted to understand it for himself."

"...Maybe," Demyx said lamely.

"Ansem might know more," Ienzo said. "He studied quite a bit of mythology when he began his experiments. I could ask him for you. I admit, I've never seen you become intellectually involved in anything."

"I just want to know," he said, a bit more sharply than intended.

Ienzo frowned. "Are you quite alright?"

"Yeah. I mean, no. I'm just…" Demyx exhaled. "Trying to figure things out. And I have no idea where to start. I don't even have my sitar. I don't really have much of anything. And I'm not meant to be here."

He blinked. "Not… meant…?"

"Face it. I'm just here because you are all too nice to get rid of me. None of you even like me. I don't share a past with you, and I'm not a scientist." He was starting to get worked up again.

Ienzo seemed to be at a loss for words. "Do you really judge your own worth using others' opinions?" he asked after a tense moment.

"Of course I do," Demyx said. "How can you not?"

"I'm sorry. I'm sorry you haven't felt welcome."

He shook his head. Tears pricked in his eyes and he blinked them back. "I have nowhere else to go," he said. "I didn't mean to dump this on you." A strange emotion twisted inside of him. Words caught in his throat. He wanted, no, needed to talk to someone.

"It doesn't bother me," Ienzo said, but his voice was halting.

"It's okay. You don't have to lie. I'm not your problem." He tried to force a smile. "I'll let you get back to your work."

The day passed in a sort of haze. He shifted from room to room in the castle, but the features and layout didn't want to stick in his mind. His chest was hurting again, dully, and after awhile he realized the pain was anxiety. Demyx got himself spectacularly lost, and by the time he found his way back up to his room, it was time to eat. He heated some soup which sat in the old-fashioned fridge and picked at it.

He hated how quiet things felt.

He'd burnt out artistically a few times, awful weeks where he couldn't compose anything worth listening to if his life depended on it. This felt just like that, but ten times worse. He felt as though he were… forgetting, somehow. He glanced down at the calluses on his left hand, partially obscured by bandages.

"There you are. I was hoping I'd see you around." Ienzo had shed his coat, and the sweater beneath was a warm shade of gray. He held a sheaf of crumpled, yellowed, and brittle pages. "I asked Ansem about the age of fairy tales. He doesn't have any texts, but after some digging, I found this. He doesn't know I took it from his library. He's been… somewhat unobservant lately."

"What is it?" Demyx asked.

"I only saw the first page, so I'm not quite certain. Perhaps we may look at it together. Come to think of it, somebody should create some record of that time. We can't repeat history a third time." His voice was fast, excited.

"I smell a new project for you," Demyx said.

"Yes. Perhaps. When I am done with my current research." The joy in his expression drained, and he sat down across from Demyx.

"What's that?"

"...I'm… trying to help Sora," Ienzo said.

"What's wrong with him?" Demyx couldn't help the bitter taste in his mouth; he had nothing but bad memories of Sora.

"He's vanished. He overstretched his power… and disappeared from this world entirely. I'm hoping that something in our old research might help the guardians of light find him. I am not so sure. You can only meddle with the forces in this world so much before there are natural, irreversible consequences. The guardians are… naturally quite cut up about it. He and I had formed something of a rapport as well. As much as I wish for him to be whole… I don't want to give myself false hope."

"...Whoa," he said, because he wasn't sure what else to say.

"There's never a moment wasted in researching," Ienzo said. "For all I know, there's some clue in these papers. And I think you can help me."

"Me?" he asked incredulously. "What happened to "I've never seen you intellectually interested in anything?""

"Have a look." Ienzo shuffled the fragile papers towards Demyx and opened to the first page. "While my scientific education has been excellent, admittedly it is somewhat lacking in the arts. I only have the most basic skills when it comes to music theory. This… seems more up your alley."

It was a full-length musical score. Demyx touched the papers. It was some of the most intricate composition works he had ever seen; the meters were odd, all over the place, somehow flowing coherently. Trills, flourishes, complicated dynamics-just looking at it made his heart race. The way the treble and bass clef mingled was so graceful.

Beneath there were lyrics in another language he couldn't understand.

"They're ancient runes. I've studied them a little. But I recognize the characters for "Keyblade", and they're in there."

Demyx read the score, his fingers itching to hear it out loud.

"Perhaps you can help me?" Ienzo asked.

"I need an instrument," he said. "It's too complex to sing."

"There's an old piano in Ansem's quarters. We can have Aeleus and Dilan move it to an empty study space. I'm sure it'll need tuning."

"I can do that." Something about this score gave him hope. He wasn't sure what. "I'm in."

For my own amusement, I've been writing the story from Ienzo's point of view as well, and finding it to be pretty fascinating. Would anybody be interested in reading it as a companion or a bonus piece? Let me know in a review.

See you next Monday!