ATUHOR'S NOSE: Playing around with the canon characters' learn orders a bit here. Canon Symphonia's story seems completely unwilling to acknowledge that it has a game attached to it so it basically goes out of its way to avoid having to care about learnsets, and I'm taking that as meaning it's free real estate for me to fiddle around with as I please.

... Oh, also, for anyone reading fandom-blind (hi Wisp 😛), the stinger on this chapter contains a few big chungus spoilers for canon Symphonia. Now's your last chance to go read a Let's Play and learn those in their proper order first, if that matters to you. Or play the actual game if you're up for putting 40 hours into a JRPG for a more authentic experience. I'd have put inline links in there but FFN doesn't allow that so just use a search engine if you're gonna do one of those things.

The sun was just about setting when I caught up with Lloyd. He winced as he spotted me. "I'd ask how it went, but..."

"Not great," I admitted superfluously, leaning on the broken hilt of my spear. "I cut holes in the fence, shattered a few shackles, and didn't manage to stick around long enough to see that anyone got out safely. I did convince the big boss that I'm an outlaw, so at least they won't go after Iselia. Unless they arbitrarily do."

"How likely do you think that is?"

"Likely enough that I'm gonna go back to Iselia to stand watch as soon as I think they're done searching for me specifically. Despite my best efforts, not every Desian that saw my face is now dead."

"Geez... You're even more reckless than I am."

"Yeah... something about these Desians just pisses me off."

"I feel the same way, but..." It was at this point that we arrived at Lloyd's house. "Well, it doesn't matter right now. Can you stay out here for a bit while I talk to my Dad? Normally I'd introduce you, but..."

"Dwarven trade secret?"

"Dwarven trade secret. Maybe afterward, though."

Lloyd went inside to talk to his Dad, and I wandered idly back down the path, back to the little creek running past the house. I glanced down at the water, which showed a remarkably clear reflection.

I already had a vague idea of what I looked like just from, like, looking down, but a reflection would make some things clearer, in particular my face — green eyes, glasses with square black rims, a light spattering of freckles, pointy little nose, ears that stuck out a bit. My hair was auburn and long, tied into a fluffy ponytail in the back, with wispy bangs in front, and a whole bunch of hair clips that — I poked at them to check — seemed to be purely decorative.

My outfit consisted of a light green shirt covered by a dark green cape (tied on with a thin rope), slightly-baggy tan slacks, and blue sneakers. (And, y'know, socks and underwear, which I obviously couldn't see but could tell were there. And immediately upon having that thought I tugged up a pant leg to see, yes, ordinary black crew socks. But I was not planning to check my underwear just then, thanks.) Everything looked fairly simple, but sturdy. On closer inspection I realized I also had a small red pendant under my shirt, on a cord of some material I couldn't immediately identify, as well as some kind of device on my left wrist (a watch?) that wasn't responding to my touch for some reason.

At this point, I heard the sound of some people approaching, and looked up to see Genis, Colette, Kratos, and a woman who I didn't recognize but was clearly related to Genis.

"What are you doing here?" Genis asked.

"Nothing important," I said with a faux-innocent grin.

"You are not subtle," Kratos remarked, seeming more amused than anything.

"What are you talking about. I was babysitting."

Genis snorted. "Right. Babysitting."

The unfamiliar woman approached me, frowning. "What are you hiding?"

I shrugged loudly. "Technically very little. I just have amnesia and legitimately don't know a lot of things. But I know you can't tell the difference. Did you see anything disturbing on your way here?"

"...No. Why?"

"Related. I'll tell you later, promise. Unless someone else tells you first. Which... is actually fairly likely, I suppose."

She frowned very loudly at this. "... I don't trust you."

"Why should you trust me? I'm a complete stranger. You don't even know my name. I don't even know my name. Speaking of names, I know everyone's here except yours..."

She sized me up for a few moments. "Tell me your name, and then I'll tell you mine."

"I — just told you, I don't know my name!"

She shrugged. "I don't see how that's my problem," she said, in a tone that suggested she didn't believe a single word I was saying.

I sighed. "Okay, then let's say..." I looked around at the forest. "... you can call me Leaf."

She glared very loudly. "You made that up just now."

"Of course I did. But it is something you can call me until I remember my real name. Assuming I don't end up hating it. Wouldn't be the first time."

"Hmph. Well, until I get your real name, you're not getting mine," she said.

I shrugged. "If that's what you want to do. How long do you think it'll be before one of your companions lets it slip? Assuming they actually try to play along with your silliness at all."

Genis shrugged. "I won't let Raine's name slip if she doesn't want me to."

There was a lengthy silence.

I tilted my head curiously. "Raine, is it?"

"... Oh, shoot," Genis mumbled.

Raine sighed. "Never mind, Genis. It's not important. I just wanted her to tell me her real name."

"Well, when I find it again, you'll be the second to know," I said flippantly. "After myself, obviously. At this point I've kinda stopped caring whether you believe me," I added when it looked like she was going to bring that point up again. "Not as though I can do anything about it, after all—"

"You don't have to hit me!"

Everyone turned towards Lloyd's house.

I was about to ask if we should be responding in some manner, when Lloyd burst out, looking as upset as he had sounded.

He screeched to an awkward halt as he realized he wasn't alone. "Oh... let me guess... you heard that just now?"

Genis stammered out something that sounded like an apology, but Raine quickly cut through the awkwardness by advising Lloyd to speak with Colette privately. She went into the house to wait on the balcony while he spoke to the others in the group real quick first.

I hung around awkwardly, not really knowing what to say or do in a situation like this, until eventually Lloyd decided to talk to me.

"So, about that Key Crest..." he said.

"Oh, that," I said. "I'd actually kinda forgotten about it, given the rest of the day." I didn't want to outright remind him about my attempted jailbreak, not where Kratos and Raine could hear it.

"Of course. Well, Dad... isn't going to make one."

"... That tracks with the hitting and the shouting, yes," I said bluntly. "Do you, um... need any help?"

He shrugged. "I don't think you could convince my Dad to change his mind. You're a total stranger to him."

"Not the Key Crest — the hitting."

"He doesn't normally hit me," Lloyd said, looking a bit perturbed. "I think he lost his temper because I was talking about risking my life going up against the Desians."

I wasn't sure what to think about that. So I decided to set it aside for the moment. "Well, they are dangerous," I said. "You see what they've done to me, and I've apparently got training and stuff."

"Yeah — what happened, anyway?"

I shrugged. "Got cocky. Big guy with an armgun snapped my spear in half. I managed to jump out, but he zapped me on the way up. Makes walking a bitch and a half."

"You're unbelievable," Lloyd said. "... well, maybe not. I'm sure you have a reason to hate the Desians so much that you'd risk your life like that."

Technically I did, but I had a feeling he was expecting something rather more personal than 'they're running torture camps'. "Yeah. Sounds like you do too."

"... They killed my mom. I thought she died in an accident, but today my Dad told me she was actually killed by Desians."

I grimaced. "That'd do it for sure. What are you gonna do now that you know that?"

"Well, I can't just keep living peacefully, that's for sure. I... I think I'm going to join Colette on her journey to seal the Desians and regenerate the world."

"Seal the Desians..." I had some questions about how that could possibly function, but Lloyd was obviously not the guy to answer them. "Sounds like a good plan to me. You should go tell Colette."

...

Once Lloyd headed up to his balcony, I drifted towards the others. Genis looked to be deep in introspection for some reason, while Raine gave me a hostile glare the moment I entered her field of view, so I decided to leave the two of them alone for now.

Kratos, on the other hand, was hanging around a gravestone — "Anna Irving", that must have been Lloyd's mom — with a big furry creature of a species I didn't recognize. The animal looked to be getting along with Kratos quite well, but when I approached the two it immediately took on a wary posture. (Or, well, I thought it looked wary, but given that I didn't even know what species it was, it's entirely possible I was misreading its body language.)

"Don't worry too much about Noishe," Kratos said. "I'm told he doesn't take well to strangers."

"He seems to be getting along fine with you," I pointed out.

"... I had a pet much like him, once."

I nodded, accepting that answer. "... uh, what kind of creature is Noishe, anyway?"

"I am reliably informed that Noishe is a dog," Kratos said in a tone that suggested he thought whoever was 'reliably informing' him was a dumbass who didn't know what they were talking about.

I looked at Noishe again. His grey-and-blue fur, his ginormous ears, and the fact that he came up to Kratos's shoulder were just the first things I saw that made me question the 'dog' story. "Is this what dogs look like around here?"

"No," Kratos said bluntly. "But I am reliably informed. So until I'm told otherwise, he's a dog."

"Well, all right then." I held a hand out to Noishe for him to sniff at. Well, he was apparently like a dog, in that this seemed to work a little bit. He didn't seem to get any friendlier, but he was at least calming down.

A sudden buzzing emanated from Kratos's pocket.

I looked at him curiously.

He seemed to be trying to ignore the noise entirely, but gave up when he realized it had gotten my attention.

With an irritated sigh, Kratos retrieved a smartphone from his pocket. "Is this yours? I picked it up near where I found you unconscious, and it's been buzzing every five minutes for an hour now, saying..." He let out another sigh, this one somehow more irritated than the last. "... 'drink your boob-hurting juice'."

"What‽" I snatched the phone out of his hand and swiped to silence the alarm — which was indeed labeled with the extremely silly phrase Kratos had quoted me, or more precisely a slightly-misspelled version of it — and was then presented with a big clock overlaid on a drawing of a buff catgirl with a big hammer... and a request for a PIN.

"A password...? Damn it." I had the solution to my amnesia problems in the palm of my hand, and I couldn't access it precisely because of my amnesia problems. "I hate irony so much."

"So it is yours?"

"It must be, I've got a battery for it," I said, dropping the phone into my backpack and taking out my hormones. "I don't know why I phrased the reminder like that — I mean, clearly I thought it was funny, I just have no clue what the joke is here — but I am supposed to take these pills twice a day, and if my genes play nice, it will result in my boobs hurting. Presumably already has," I added after a quick glance down at my chest, "though I obviously don't remember that."

Kratos sighed. "Never mind... What manner of device is that, anyway?" Kratos continued.

It was at this point

that something incredibly, stupidly obvious finally occurred to me.

Up until now I hadn't even seen a single use of electricity anywhere in this place, not so much as a lightbulb. Yet here I had apparently been running around with a high-tech smartphone as though that was a completely normal thing to do. Hell, even now that I realized how out-of-place it was, it still felt normal for me!

What in the world had I been planning, why did it involve bringing high tech to a low-tech location, and how the hell did I forget all of it?

What in the world was I?

...

"Leaf? Leaf, are you all right?"

Kratos's call brought my attention back to the outside world. I suddenly noticed that my fists were clenched and my fingernails were digging into my palms. I opened my hands and shook them out. "Um. Maybe. What was the question?"

"...Forget it. It's not important." The rest of the group was heading out, presumably back to Iselia, so I imagined he didn't have time to discuss my ~mystery device~ now.

I hadn't talked much to Colette yet, so I drifted over to walk by her. "So, this journey of regeneration thing. How's that gonna work?"

"Um," Colette ummed. "Well, we're going to go to a bunch of seals, and I'll do a ritual to unseal the Summon Spirits inside."

I nodded. "Why're the spirits currently sealed?"

Colette looked a bit panicked and glanced to Raine for help. Raine sighed, but answered. "The Summon Spirits were sealed by the Desians, after Martel's seal on them weakened and they reappeared in the world."

"Oh, they've already been sealed before? Is this a recurring thing?"

"Unfortunately, yes. Colette is going to be the seventh Chosen of Regeneration. Martel's seal simply doesn't last forever. It must be restored when it falls — and the journey of regeneration is arduous, so the Chosen doesn't always make it to the end. The last one died."

"So that's how it is..." Somehow I wasn't surprised. Well, I'd heard Kratos mention Colette being the next Chosen earlier in the day, but somehow the exact nature of the process was... not as much of a shock as it could've been. "Has there been any progress on a more permanent solution?"

Raine tilted her head curiously. "None that I'm aware of... I'm not particularly familiar with the inner workings of Cruxis, though."

"Hmm," I hmm'd. "I suppose we'll have to ask them about it."

"We?"

I shrugged. "I mean... I'm a trained spear-wielder with healing magic and who knows what other skills, and I've got literally nothing else to do."

"This isn't a field trip," Kratos grumbled.

"If it was, I'd be a chaperone, not a student~" I countered, in perhaps a needlessly flippant tone. "But we can discuss it in complete detail in the morning before you leave. For now, I gotta keep a watch over Iselia in case someone decides to take vengeance."

"You do know that it's incredibly obvious you interfered at the human ranch, right?" Kratos said.

"I'm sure you can infer anything you want," I said.

"Is this what you meant by asking about anything 'disturbing' on our way here?" Raine asked, glaring loudly.

"It's certainly a thing that could fit the bill. ... Look, I can tell you that nobody working the ranch saw anyone they know to be associated with Iselia — my concern is that, if something hypothetically happened involving a completely unrelated and mysterious third party, they'll go after Iselia anyway just because the town is an obvious target."

"... and so you're keeping watch," Raine said. She frowned very loudly as she thought about this. "... We can't delay setting out on the journey of regeneration. Not even for a day."

"... No, I suppose not." Even in the most extreme worst-case scenario, all of Iselia being destroyed would be less bad than the entire world dying. ... Assuming that was what would happen if the regeneration journey failed. Which maybe it wouldn't; the last one failed, apparently. But how many times could they fail before things went irrecoverably catastrophic? It had to be a finite number.

"Then I suppose I'll be staying there until I'm sure things are safe," I continued, shrugging loudly.

"You change your mind quickly," Raine remarked.

"I mean, I do still intend to catch up with you once I leave. But for probably the next few days, I'm assisting from afar."

"Yes, afar would be the best place for you to be assisting from."

I sighed. "You are very suspicious of me, huh?"

"You said I shouldn't trust you," she countered.

"Point of order — I didn't say you shouldn't trust me, I simply pointed out that there was no reason why you should trust me."

"Close enough," Raine said with a scoff. "... At least if something does happen, the town will have had warning, and time to prepare."

"... yes. Yes they will."

At this point we were getting close enough to the human ranch that I decided I'd better split off and go through the woods so the Desians didn't see me. I didn't see them again after I got back to Iselia.

The next morning, Kratos, Colette, and Raine were heading out just a few hours after sunrise. Genis was seeing them off, but...

"I don't see Lloyd anywhere," I said, giving Colette a curious look from my perch in the guard tower.

"Huh?" It took her a moment to recognize my voice through the ridiculous mask i had improvised from a spare shirt. Well, that confirmed that it worked to conceal my identity, at least from casual inspection. "Oh. Haha, yeah, that's weird. He must have overslept."

"Today, of all days?"

"He did need to stay up late finishing my birthday present..."

I frowned, not sure whether that explained it or made it more implausible. "... I guess he'll have to give it to you when he catches up."

"You seem very sure that that's going to happen," Kratos said.

I shrugged. "He said he wanted to join Colette on the journey of regeneration. I'm planning to catch up with you all later, after I'm surer about the situation with the Desians. It seems obvious that he can join me on my way there."

Kratos sighed. "... If I tell you once more that this isn't a field trip, you are just going to 'follow us on your own' this time, aren't you?"

I gave Kratos a smug grin. Though I don't think he saw it. "Look, with Desians and everything after you, surely you would benefit from having as many hands as you can gather?"

Kratos just hmph'd and continued out the front gate.

Genis waved goodbye to his sister as the three of them left... then after a moment he turned to face me. "I don't know why Lloyd isn't here. If he doesn't show up in a few minutes, I'm going to Dirk's house to chew him out."

...

Of course he didn't show up. Genis ended up leaving, fuming. A few hours after that, he came back with a much less angry and more worried look on his face, matching Lloyd's utterly bewildered expression. The two headed towards the back of town, towards what I was fairly sure was the Brunel household.

I didn't follow them. I was still looking out for Desians, and if anything important happened there I could just ask them about it.

I had just about started to let my guard down when I saw them. A squadron of Desians marching out of the forest. I allowed myself a tiny flicker of hope that this was somehow a coincidence — but no, they immediately turned to march upon Iselia.

"Get ready," I told the other guards, firmly grasping both the guard's borrowed spear and my broken one.

In retrospect, I owe Raine a massive debt of gratitude. There were many, many things about this situation that I had failed to account for, but thanks to her, I at least hadn't forgotten to warn the people of Iselia.

One thing I had failed to account for, for example, is that while I absolutely had the skill to take on a dozen Desian mooks in combat at once... I could only actually do that if they all fought me, instead of doing the obvious thing and just rushing past.

Along with the town guard, I only kept a few guys occupied at the front gate for a minute before the rest overran us. I turned around and chased them, of course, but I couldn't stop them all. It wasn't long before the town was in flames.

Thankfully, most of the buildings were empty. With my warning, the citizens had all had time to evacuate to the Martel Temple. There was one building that wasn't empty, of course, but the Desians didn't reach the Brunel household.

I was too focused on fighting the invaders to keep much track of what happened, but after a few minutes, the big guy with the armgun, what had he called himself — Forcystus — marched into the town's front plaza.

"Genis Sage, come forth!" declared one of his underlings with a fancy hat.

... Something about that sentence chilled me to the bone. Probably worse for Genis to hear his name like that, of course. The active combat seemed to have died down, so I stayed out of sight, waiting for my moment.

"Inferior beings, listen up!" Forcystus shouted. "I am Forcystus, one of the Five Desian Grand Cardinals. I am a superior half-elf who rules over the farm where we cultivate you pathetic humans."

He was really pressing hard on the fantasy racism button, for some reason.

"Genis! You have been found guilty of aiding and abetting an outlaw's attack on the human ranch, which puts you in violation of the non-aggression treaty. Therefore, I bring judgement upon you and this village!"

"You violated the treaty first!" Lloyd shouted. "You tried to kill Colette!" Had he seriously already forgotten our conversation — no, he might be probing for information, and/or trying to cover his ass.

"Us, kill the Chosen?" fancy-hat man said, laughing. "I see now. They must be after the Chosen."

"What are you talking about‽"

"I have no need to explain myself to the likes of you," Forcystus said. "The only thing that matters is that the outlaw woman who calls herself Leaf attacked several guards of the human ranch, damaged numerous parts of its infrastructure, and attempted to foment a rebellion amongst its prisoners — and you, Genis Sage, assisted her in these actions. On top of that, you've been in contact with host body F192."

That was... an impressively complete description of things. The only thing they missed was that Lloyd was involved as well. I don't even know how they figured out my name already when I hadn't even been calling myself that when this all went down.

"It sounds like you're just going after him as an excuse," I said, stepping out into the plaza and pulling my mask off. "It sounds like what you're really after is me."

Forcystus gave an evil grin. "I was hoping to track you down as well today, yes. So kind of you to make it easy for me. We've prepared appropriate opponents for your crimes."

That last sentence gave me the same chill as hearing Genis's name had. As did the trio of green, twisted, vaguely humanoid abominations that approached at his words.

"What are those things‽" Lloyd asked, horrified.

"Now, receive your punishment!"

The monsters charged at us.

They moved clumsily, swinging their arms like hammers, so Lloyd and I tried to draw their attention while avoiding their attacks, giving Genis room to hit them with magic. "Aqua Edge!"

Seeing him cast magic a few times sparked something in the back of my mind, and I started channeling what had to be one of my forgotten skills. Yes, I remember now — "Copycat — Aqua Edge!"

We still took a few hits, and since there were three of them same as us, one of them kept managing to sneak past and take potshots at Genis. But when it did that I drew its attention back with my copy spell.

The fight could be best described as unsettling. As it went on, I got the impression that they had used to be... human. That even now they were suffering, lashing out at us because they couldn't think through their pain. One attack they kept using was literally to clutch their head in agony, unleashing waves of something dark and painful.

The battle turned more in our favor once one of them stopped moving, and Lloyd and I could hold the attention of the other two without worrying about Genis. The second one went down quickly.

The third one let out a swing at Lloyd's face as it collapsed, which he blocked with his hands, and it tore a cloth off, revealing his Exsphere more clearly.

"Lord Forcystus! That boy has an Exsphere! And it matches the description you gave us of the Angelus Project!"

"What?" Forcystus marched on Lloyd, stepping over the fallen monsters. "... It is! Give it to me!"

"Never!" Lloyd shouted. "This Exsphere is a memento of my mom, who you Desians murdered!"

Forcystus faltered, looking confused. "... No? The Angelus Project's host body, what was her number... the humans called her Anna."

"That's my mom, you bastard!"

Forcystus nodded slowly. "That makes you Lloyd Irving, then. But Anna was—hnngk‽"

He didn't get a chance to say what Anna was, as suddenly the last monster lurched back up and wrapped its arms around his neck. Apparently it wasn't dead after all. And its decision to go after Forcystus was not quelling my suspicions.

"Genis... Lloyd... Leaf... run!" There was no doubt. The voice coming out of its... her throat, could only be —

"Marble‽" Genis exclaimed.

"Genis... You were like a grandson to me."

Forcystus grunted as he tried futilely to struggle out of her grip. "No, no!"

I realized he wasn't going to have much time — I could feel Marble gathering mana at a dangerous speed, and then —

BOOM.

... and when the smoke cleared, she was gone.

Forcystus seethed as the other Desians quickly formed ranks around him. "... Lloyd. We will always come after you as long as you possess that Exsphere. Always!" And with those parting words, he teleported the entire army out.

The Desians had retreated. I healed as many of the guard as I could, but... not all of them made it. And even of those who were still alive, it seemed like my magic couldn't heal them very quickly.

Genis and I were trying to use his water magic to put out the fires, which helped marginally more than the surviving guards' bucket brigade, mainly because we didn't have to go back to the well to refill it.

Other than the guard, the vast majority of the village was still evacuated. The only civilians left were Frank and Phaidra, actually, who were the first to arrive after I sounded the all-clear bell.

"Genis is a wanted criminal now, I'm a complete outlaw at least in the Desians' eyes, and Lloyd has an Exsphere they really really want cause of some project of theirs," I summed up the situation. "It's... not safe for us to stay here anymore, is it?"

"While only a few people died, many people will have lost their homes," Frank said. "And... a few people dying, even if they accepted the risks when they joined the guard, is still tragic."

I looked at the monsters still lying dead in the plaza. The prisoners. "Not just the guard, either. ... I can't let this happen again."

"If you feel that way, please catch up to the Chosen and protect her," Phaidra said.

"... Right. That was my plan before all this happened anyway."

"It's likely the mayor will formally exile you for this," Frank said. "Even though you saved lives by giving us time to prepare, it won't be hard for him to argue that you were the cause of the danger in the first place. All three of you."

"Wh — Lloyd and Genis, too‽" Genis could maybe be argued to hold responsibility on some level, since he'd apparently been visiting Marble regularly, but the Desians hadn't even known Lloyd was involved. As far as I could tell, they still didn't. Though, that special Exsphere of his...

"Lloyd has always been an outsider here, and... to a lesser extent, so has Genis. He'll be looking for someone to blame, and Forcystus did call all three of you out by name."

I huffed. "Figures. Whatever. We'd have been too busy helping Colette save the world to come back here anyway."

"Hopefully, with your help, the world will be saved very swiftly," Phaidra said.

"Kratos Aurion. Mentor to Mithos Yggdrasill, widower of Anna Irving, and father of Lloyd Irving."

Kratos drew his sword. "Show yourself. I know you've been following us."

A figure emerged from the foliage. "I didn't really think I was hiding from you," she said, smirking. "I was just waiting for nightfall — I don't need the others involved in this. So let's cut to the chase.

"I'm here to knock some sense into my friend. You probably haven't seen her, but I know her — you're gonna."

"... and what of it?"

"I imagine you're gonna want her out of your way anyway at this stage, right? Just don't interfere when I make my move. In exchange for your assistance in this matter, I won't be mentioning anything incriminating to certain... crucial parties."

"... Beware meddling in things you don't understand, girl. My mission is to protect the Chosen. Nothing more."

"Believe me, I understand more than you can possibly imagine. My goal doesn't conflict with yours. Remember that when the time comes, and you'll be fine." And before Kratos could respond, she was gone.

Deleted scene:

"Sounds like a good plan to me. You should go tell your girlfriend."

Lloyd flushed a brighter red than his jacket. "Gi— you mean Colette? We're not — I mean — she isn't — we're friends, that's all."

"Oh, my mistake," I said, waving it off. "Must've misread the vibes." That was a total lie — I hadn't actually thought they were dating, but I wasn't sure whether Lloyd had noticed his obvious crush on his friend or not, so I had dropped the G-word to see what would happen. "Still, you should go talk to her. It's getting late, and I'm guessing you've spoken to everyone else by now already."

(... stars that looks awful but ffn doesnt have blockquotes) ... anyway, I deleted that because I realized there was no way in hell or double hell that Leaf had figured this out from the nonexistent Colloyd interaction she could have seen so far. Actual Symphonia players might have been shipping them by this point in the game, but we have way more context than Leaf does. (Speaking of, fandom-blind readers, if you didn't look at canon earlier, LPs are still there...)

That and I have a way better idea of her character now than I did when I originally wrote that bit, and it doesn't really fit her anymore even if she had figured them out by now.