Final Fantasy Short Stories | (2016-2017)

Story thirty seven: Mind Breaths (2020)

What is this?

Every step she took on the slippery wood hallway, Aerith heard a breath. A breath that wasn't from her own lungs. It was sharp, desperate, and from the deep pit of her mind.

I don't need this.

She tried to steady her sense of being by grasping the head-rail of a chair, blinking her eyes to adjust to the dark of the room she'd entered. Above all else, she tried to listen to her own breathing. Slow and forceful puffs of air were moving to and from her own nostrils, she could feel it just fine.

She just couldn't hear herself.

Aerith shook her head, and brown braids gently slapped the skin of her neck. Delicate fingers slid across the wood of the lined chairs until knuckles became white, stiff, and latched onto another chair-head in a sudden chokehold. The mind-breaths came in stronger, louder, like someone was pumping their soul into her ear. Like someone was right there next to her, pressed up against her to the point of bones against bones.

I don't need this! Aerith repeated, and she was surprised she could hear her own thoughts. Go away!

At this point she had squeezed her eyes shut, but instead of reopening them and trying to shove herself back to reality, she found herself listening closely to each ragged exhale. Carefully and on purpose, she picked at the noise. What was this telling her? What did it mean? And why . . .?

Why did it begin to sound familiar?

Aerith had never heard this before in her life, she was sure of it. But the voice started to tune in clearer. A nostalgic wave weaved itself together. Slowly, a face formed within the sight of her brain. And when it finally clicked into place with a pang of realization . . .

Aerith gasped and almost lost her balance as her eyes sprung open.

"No," she said, voice hushed and hoarse. The pulsating breathing had just stopped, so now she finally had power to talk. But that was a small comfort. Now she had a bigger problem dangling above her. "There's no way that could've been . . . It makes no sense that could ever be . . ."

A tongue shot out to wet Aerith's lips, but it was sand-dry. She couldn't get his name out her throat. The disbelief was so overpowering, all she could do was repeat it over and over through her head.

...

Tseng. It's Tseng.

06/2020

End of story thirty seven