Kai's Memories

This is wrong.

Why did she never wonder about her lack of parents, the question mark lingering in her unknown place of birth? No matter where she went in the world, none of it called to her. None of it was right. Only the ocean could soothe the feeling of displacement, of unbelonging, but it wasn’t quite home.

Now she’s finally found it. And it feels so wrong.

Not only that, but she can’t even remember being here.

There are impressions, not real memories. The uphill path from the beach to the town, a trek her legs remember though she herself can’t. But when she opens her eyes on the familiar trail, tendrils of Maldrus stare tentatively back at her, slinking away as she approaches. The sand is black, the grass dead, the cliffside path oozing.

They pass beneath an archway to a town decaying. Most of the buildings are gone; one that remains mostly intact has a giant tentacle sprouting straight through the fractured roof. If she closes her eyes and focuses hard enough, there’s a brief feeling of lush grass, swaying palm trees, the bright browns of clean wooden slats baked by years of sunlight.

And then it slips and all she can see is rot.

“Recognize anything?” Alistair murmurs, glaive clutched in his hands as he eyes a nearby pocket of Maldrus.

Helplessly she looks around at what’s left of a life she can’t even remember. She recognizes it. And yet she doesn’t. “Maybe.”

Dezzy’s hand slips into her numb own. They keep walking.

As they reach the top of the tallest hill, stare up at a lighthouse painted with mildew and Maldrus, she finally gets the jolt of familiarity she’s been searching for. Her pointed finger lifts up, up to the sky, up towards where the eerie purple light glows with malice.

This, finally, is home. What’s left of it.