Some people leave an imprint on our lives, like leaves changing color for the season, just to remain that shade forever. The ghost of you remains with me through everything I do and am.

I still think of you when I say my name, and I remember, even if the years try to dim even those memories, even the times when memory becomes like a cloudy mirror, nearly impossible to discern, I remember.

And I still think of His Majesty, of Hiryuu, when I clutch my necklace, like a heart beating within my chest, it keeps me going.

I see Abi, Shuten, and Guen within the present day dragon warriors, like how children resemble their parents and somehow in little ways, their grandparents too.

Memory is a tricky thing, as it grows dimmer like a candle, but doesn't completely burn out either; it's resilient.

I miss the way your hand fit in mine, shyly but perfectly; we were a puzzle together that should have been impossible, a puzzle never meant to be: one dying young, one living forever.

I miss your laugh, how it sprang up like a river, full and overflowing. I miss the way your smile sank so deep into my heart that I felt warm all over.

I miss you. I miss everything about you, Kaya, even when my memories flicker dangerously close to burning out. You've been my everything throughout the years, and my one wish is that I could see you again.

I wish I could see all of you again. Those that changed my leaf color, leaving a permanent mark and a longing that I can't quite forget. You've all made me who I am today, though time is a constant, that never ages me, I hope I've grown in some ways regardless, that hints of you all shine through me, until everyone sees a part of you through me. Even if they think it's just a Zeno thing, even if they never realized it came through knowing you, like a precious gift that never grows old.

It's hard sometimes without you, like a dying flower, all dry, every inch, color slowly fading out, hard. It's hard, especially because I am that flower, stuck like that, and I can't die, but I also can't suddenly go back to what I was before.

A person is more than a body after all. But my soul is tired, tired of being without you. I hope to see you again. I more than hope; I long to see you, all, again, to no longer have to say goodbye.

I never want to forget you or the way you said my name, the old nicknames, the title that never grows old, as if each new generation revives it, even without the formality. I see you everywhere, in birds as they flutter past; a reminder of Abi's or the way someone tends to a garden, which reminds me of Kaya.

Or the color red, everywhere it rests as a reminder of Hiryuu. Or the way brotherhood reminds me of Guen, or the way that dark green can spring up little reminders of Shuten, the one that Guen always called Greenie, an easier nickname for Rokuryuu.

There's reminders everywhere, but I am seeing them alone. I wish you could sit beside me, that I could hear all of your voices, and have more than reminders.