The stranger blinked. Her slightly grimacing mouth pulled down further into a frown. "Hah-hah," she deadpanned. "Very funny, Valon."

Valon, bewildered, took a cautious step back. Who was this strange woman, and what did she want with him? "Hey," he mumbled. "How d'you know my name?"

The woman blinked again and pursed her colored lips in indignation. "This isn't funny, Valon," she snapped, stiffly crossing her arms.

"No," Valon agreed, frowning. "It's not. Who are you and what do you want with me?"

"Dammit, Valon!" Mai exclaimed. "Grow up and stop acting like you don't know me!"

"I-I'm... I'm not acting," Valon stammered, holding his hands up defensively. "Trust me, miss. I would certainly remember a person like you."

The color drained from the woman's face as realization overtook her. "Oh, my god," she moaned, bringing a soft-looking hand up to her mouth. "You're serious, aren't you?"

Valon, eyeing her warily, nodded tentatively. "Honest, I don't," he murmured. "H-how d'you know who I am?"

"You really don't remember me, Valon?" the stranger pressed on, ignoring his question, sounding surprisingly hurt.

The surprises just kept coming, didn't they? Valon felt sorry for her now. Maybe it was just because he was such a softy now, but he hated to see her so distraught. "No," he whispered, realizing that he really didn't want to disappoint her and that he really wanted to see her smile. He searched his brain, trying to remember if they had maybe met once. He knew they could not have known each other as children because he didn't really make friends as a kid, so if he knew her, he would have met her in his time working for Dartz. True, there had been women from time to time when he got lonely and Raph and Al didn't want to go out with him in their free time, but they never stuck around in one place long enough for him to form any meaningful relationships. Valon also knew that she was not from his excursion in Europe; he had all the important ones' information stored in his phone for whenever he wanted to drop a message, and she was not in his list of contacts, nor did he have any memories of her.

He wanted to believe her, but who could she possibly be?

"So you remember nothing about our time together," she mumbled, speaking more to herself than to him.

Valon shook his head helplessly. "I'm sorry," he said earnestly. "I gotta go now," he told her, slowly turning around and jogging off, hoping not to run into more strangers claiming to know him.

He found the advertisement by chance.

Lacuna, it said. For those who need help with forgetting.

It was a small 2x3 ad in a magazine. It was coincidence, pure coincidence that he'd given it a passing glance, but it was curiosity that made him give in and call.

"Have you ever found yourself wishing you could erase your memory?"

Valon heard angry fifteen year olds screaming, banging on metal doors; he felt arms restrain him, pulling him back while he screamed and struggled. He smelled smoke, felt searing heat on his face, heard wailing five year olds. He heard grown men pleading as the Seal closed in on them. He heard clothes and other possessions being hastily thrown in a bag, heard heels skittering out the room and the door slamming shut. He heard the aggressive silence that overtook him.

"Valon?"

"Hm?"

"Did you hear me?"

"Oh, yeah. Yeah. I have. Who hasn't?"

"Yes, well, that's where we come in. If there's someone in your life you would rather forget, that's when you come to us."

Valon looked at the so-called doctor sitting across from him. A tiny, skinny man with off white hair to match the off white room in which they sat. The man squinted at Valon behind eye classes with tiny lenses that looked too small to be of any practical use. The room was undecorated, but he supposed that really didn't matter, did it? But for the table where Dr. Curtis had laid out a digital recorder, a notepad, and several legal forms for another client, the room was bare of any furnishings. "Yeah? That so?"

Dr. Curtis sighed and removed his glasses, folding them up and slipping them into his pocket. He steepled his thin fingers before his thin mustache and stared at Valon. "Valon," he said calmly. "Why are you here?"

"To forget," Valon replied simply.

"If that truly is the case, then could you stop trying to act like I'm selling snake oil?"

"Sorry," Valon apologized. "It's just hard to wrap my head around. It's like something out of sci-fi, y'know?"

"I understand that you're feeling somewhat incredulous," Dr. Curtis replied soothingly, folding his hands on the table. "Anyone who has not seen the effect Lacuna has on people would have their reservations. So tell me, Valon: do you wish to continue?"

"'Course," Valon responded without missing a beat.

Dr. Curtis nodded. "Very well, then. Now before we can discuss scheduling a proper interview, I'll answer any questions you have now."

Valon paused for a moment. "Just walk me through it."

Valon spent that night staring at the ceiling in his bed, which was small by most standards, but felt unbearably empty to him. This, Valon realized as he spread his legs wide open to touch both sides of the bed with the heels of his feet, was why he'd called Lacuna, why he'd gone in the first place to talk to Dr. Curtis.

"Why are you doing this?" Raphael's voice, even if Valon hadn't seen the big guy in months.

"Because I don't need that weighing on me," Valon replied in his head.

"Is Mai Valentine really the worst thing that's ever happened to you?"

"Of course not."

"Then why her, Valon? Out of all of the things you've seen in your short life, why do you choose to forget her?"

Valon sighed and rolled onto his side, back facing his imaginary companion. "'Cause if I erased all of the bad from my life, I'd forget who I am, where I came from. My past shaped me, Raph. But this? This is something I can do without."

Raphael left him alone after that, leaving Valon to struggle with his thoughts until he finally fell asleep, trying not to pay attention to the fact that he was alone in his bed.