Hullo, quick authors note here. In case anyone noticed, you might have seen my new cover for the story! My sister made it for me. If you want to check her out, her dA is Kimikohi (I'd post a link, but Fanfiction doesn't like links very much). Onto the story... (And guess what, this chapter is twice as long as normal! And something actually HAPPENS!)
Molly awoke feeling better rested than normal. She sat up, stretched, and yawned. She leapt out of bed and prepared herself a breakfast of cherries and some bananas that Liam had received from an island and was carefully growing on the beach. It was sweet and delicious, and she found herself humming the tune of K.K. Ballad, while eyeing the violin. No more of that, she thought. No more paranormal stuff. No more headaches. I'm sick of it. She took the violin and shoved it in her wardrobe. She pulled out her fishing rod. I'm going to be a normal villager. I'm gonna dig up fossils, eat some cherries, and fish for fish. Treat Liam as the mayor, not a close friend. In fact, speaking of friends, I've been kind of cold to everyone lately. I think I'll pay Pippy a visit.
Molly took her rod and exited the house, smiling at the world. She strolled to Pippy's house. Smoke billowed from the chimney. Molly knocked three times and waited. The door flung open.
"Hey there, li'l hare! What's up?"
"Sorry for coming so early. I was bored and wanted to chat. I haven't talked to you lately."
"Awesome! Come on in!" Pippy gestured madly into her house, and Molly obeyed.
"Nice place you have," Molly said in wonder. She observed the fancy kitchen island and chaise lounge.
"That kitchen was a gift from Nook, Timmy told me. He said that they don't sell those anymore and it's real rare," Pippy said importantly.
"The music's nice too," Molly replied, taking in the house,
"Oh, yeah! I love to dance to it! Want to dance with me? We can drink punch! Or orange juice! Hmm, Solaris doesn't have oranges, though. Ooh! How about cran-cherry punch? Urgh, we don't have cranberries, either. Oh well! We can always…" the rabbit talked endlessly, and Molly was getting dizzy.
"Why don't we just…bake a pie?" Molly bursted.
"OOOOOOOOOH! You got the right idea, li'l hare! A pie! A banana pie! An upside-down banana cream pie!" Pippy jumped up and down. "I'll get the dry ingredients, you can get the wet ones. Don't worry, I don't mind you looking through my stuff!" Pippy rocketed off to her fridge. Molly walked over more slowly, and took out some eggs. Pippy sang some kind of song while picking up the flour.
"That sounds nice, where's it from?" Molly asked.
"From?" Pippy's face contorted into confusion. "…Y'know…I'm not sure…I think it's…" Pippy trailed off, and for the rest of the ingredient-gathering, she stayed silent. She didn't say anything until the batter was in the oven.
"Thanks for coming over, Molly. It was fun!" the old cheer was back in her voice.
"Yeah, it was fun to be here. I ought to get going though."
"Not until the pie's done!" Pippy pouted.
"Alright," Molly replied.
They watched TV until the oven dinged! and raced over, taking in the wonderful smell. Just then, the door produced a familiar knocking noise.
"I'll get it!" Molly said, already running for the door. Her morning with Pippy made her bubbly and peppier than normal. To her surprise, Liam was standing there.
"Molly?" he said in surprise. "What're you doing here?"
"We just baked a pie!" Pippy yelled from the back of the house. "Want some?"
"No thanks. Smells great, though!" Liam called back. "I caught that goldfish you wanted."
"EEEEEEE!" Pippy raced to Liam and took the fishbowl from his hands. "I think I'll name him…" Pippy paused. "…Twinkle Twinkle. Twinkle for short," Pippy said finally.
Those words sound familiar, Molly thought. Then she recalled the song Pippy sang earlier; the lyrics had been twinkle, twinkle, little star, how I wonder what you are.
"T-that's a nice name," Liam stammered.
"Here, I gotta thank you," Pippy insisted. "Here." Pippy placed three small cubes of pie in his hand.
"Oh, thanks." he ate one and chewed contentedly. A smile spread on his face. "Tastes like home."
"That's good, right?" Pippy asked worriedly.
"Definitely. It's the best taste of all."
Pippy broke into a grin.
"Ohmygosh, really? I've never baked with someone else, but Molly is super good at it! I was just sooo sick of cherry pie, and I'm really glad you got those bananas from that island! I wonder what home tastes like. OH. MY. GOSH. Have you like, eaten a HOUSE before?! Ha! Just kidding. But really, you haven't eaten a hou-"
"Molly, can I talk to you for a second?" Liam interrupted.
"What? Sure." Molly was too busy eyeing those delicious banana-cream-pie-cubes.
As if reading her mind, Pippy plopped three into Molly's hands (wings).
Molly grinned at her, and left the house.
"What now?" Molly asked, popping a cube into her mouth.
"So, uh, I want to know if you've remembered anything. That probably sounds weird. Or if-"
"You know what, Liam?" Molly snapped. "I don't care. I'm sick of you stalking me. Every time we meet up, you always go on about 'remembering' and these weird stories, and I'm sick of it. I just want to be a normal villager here. Everywhere I turn, you're there. From now on, I'm just a resident, and you're the mayor. Period."
Liam's face hardened, and Molly suddenly regretted her words. She had been too harsh. But Liam's next words surprised her.
"You want the whole story?" he said coldly. "Fine. I'll tell you the whole story." Molly had intended to stick to her resolve, but she had so many unanswered questions that she was curious.
"Pippy, I need to talk with Molly for a little while. Is it okay if I take her?" he called into the house.
"Totally! In fact, I think Jacques should be coming over in…EEEEK! Like, five minutes! I've totally, like, gotta set up, li'l hare!" Liam sighed and shut the door.
He grabbed her wing. "Come on. Lets get to the beach. Nobody else can hear this." Molly tensed. She was nervous now.
He led her to the beach, and checked no one was there.
Liam turned back to Molly. His eyes seemed to burn. His first sentence, the superficial sentence, not even deep into the story, only scraping the tip of the iceberg; stunned Molly, and was unsure if she could be the 'normal citizen' she wanted to be with this information.
"You used to be a human."
"WHAT?!" Molly yelled. Then she whirled around, hoping no one heard.
"You were a human. Everyone in this village used to be a human. Remember that story I told you when I was weeding the town? It was true. It wasn't just a story. And the other Molly I was talking about…was you."
Molly stared at him, dumbfounded. He launched into an explanation.
"The Operation was performed to lock away memories in a far part of your brain, not erase them. In order to erase them, it would involve actually removing part of your brain, and nobody wanted to risk that." Liam picked up a stick and drew a diagram in the sand. It was a vertical line; on the right side was a triangle, on the left was a circle.
"This circle represents your memories," Liam said, "and the triangle represents the memories you've made while living in Solaris. The line represents the medicine."
"The wh-" Molly started, but Liam held up a finger.
"The medicine is incredibly high-tech. It treats your old memories-your circle-as a virus. If a memory leaks through the barrier, the medicine senses it, and starts reacting to it. That's the reason behind your headaches," Liam explained. Molly listened in wonderment. "However, if too many memories start flowing in at once, the medicine freaks out and knocks you out. If you're not awake, you can't remember things, so the medicine repairs the hole you broke in the barrier."
"Lets say I want to transfer your memories over to the other side. If I start telling you about your old life, forcing you to remember, it'll be too much. You'll get knocked out, and you'll forget everything I told you."
"That's what happened the first time, right?" Molly asked.
"Yep. I started telling you all these things about your old life, and all that stuff happened. Now I know we have to go slowly if we want to bring all your memories back."
"Why would I want them back?"
"Because once all the memories are safely on the other side, the Operation will undo itself."
"Does that mean…" Molly choked out, unable to finish.
"Yes," Liam whispered. "You'll be human again."
Molly tensed and began shivering. A human! I'll be a human…
"Thats my plan," Liam continued. "Now…" he erased the line, and drew a thick wall instead. "…lets treat the medicine as a wall. Lets pretend I'm your memories. I live on the circle, you live on the triangle. I want to see you, so my plan is to start hammering on the wall until I can fit through it and see you."
Molly wished he would stop. Her head was swimming, and now that she understood what that meant, she was nervous to pay attention. She didn't want to forget all this information.
"If I hammer the hell out of that wall, you'll be like 'What the heck are you doing to my wall?' and you'll make me go away and repair the wall."
"I wouldn't do that."
"I think you would, if I got an axe and started banging on your house in the middle of the night. Anyway, if I hammer at it slowly, and make small holes, you won't notice until the hole is big enough for me to go through. Same with the medicine. If we transfer a very small memory at a time, the medicine wont sense it; it isn't sensitive enough." he let out a huge breath. "There. Satisfied?"
"How the heck do you KNOW all that stuff?" Molly blurted out.
"I snooped. My dad worked in the government, and he got all the reports on it. I found the papers and emails under his desk."
Molly froze. Breathing was hard. "That's…true?"
"True? Did someone tell you?" Liam said incredulously.
"No. It was a dream." Reality hit Molly and she felt sick. "It was a memory, Liam. Me and you…on a field…you told me that. Something about new realities and worlds?"
Liam's face turned pink. "Oh…that…" he was silent for a moment. Then his head shot up and Molly jumped.
"I forgot about the whole different worlds thing!" Liam shouted. He lowered his voice. "That's a pretty important bit. But I don't think I can tell it to you yet. I've already said too much. You're probably on the verge of passing out." Liam sighed. "You should go do normal stuff."
"Can I take a nap?"
"No way. If you do, you'll still forget. It doesn't have to be forced."
"Oh." Molly noticed that she had left the upside-down banana cream pie cubes in her wings, and now the cream was melting all over her feathers.
"Ew. I guess I'll take a bath," she said, popping the last cubes in her mouth.
"Right. See you around, Molly." Liam got up and slowly walked away. Molly viewed him in a completely different light now. Gone was the human boy who didn't belong here, gone was the frustrated kid who talked to himself. Now, there was a person who had spent a years of time as Molly's friend, months of chats and nights to go out to ice cream, weeks of sleepovers, days of parties.
And Molly remembered none of it.
I~I~I~I~I~I
Molly tentatively reached for the violin.
Just take it, she told herself. It's not like you'll ever be able to be normal.
Molly tried to imagine herself as a human, but it seemed too utterly unnatural. A duck is what Molly felt like. It's just the medicine telling you that.
Molly picked up the violin and unconsciously began playing. This time, instead of losing herself, she payed attention to the music.
Listen, Molly. Do you remember playing this piece? Do you remember practicing it?
Molly closed her eyes, the music slowing. A memory was trying to break through the barrier; Molly urged it on. She could feel it, tickling her mind as it tried to escape its prison.
Bits and pieces of a memory, a dream, perhaps, came floating to her. Not a full sequence, just flakes of snow in a blizzard. A crowd, watching expectantly. A deep breath. Liam's smile and a thumbs-up. Thundering applause. A big grin.
Molly gasped and fell back onto the bed, the violin screeching to a halt. That one memory had squeezed past, and now all the others wanted to join it. Molly pressed her wings against her temple to fight against them. In stark contrast to just a second ago, instead of trying to help the memories along, she was resisting them. You're going to have to wait another day, old Molly. I can't remember now. It's too much…
In a minute, the memories stopped fighting, and hung back. Molly paused, waiting for the headache to return, the aching drowsiness. But it was done. For now.
Molly sat on her bed for a while, watching the slow arc of the sun. Normally, she'd like to digest what just happened, but she knew better. She had to resist or else she'd pass out; she had to convince the medicine she was complying with it.
Shakily, Molly stood up and took a deep breath. Even if it felt unnatural, even if the headaches were too painful, even if she did end up passing out, she would follow through. She would become human again. In the end, it would all be worth it.
Hopefully.