Lapsus Memoriae [Rávamë's Bane: Book 1]

Part I : Chapter 3 ~ Me, Myself & A Ranger

Part I : Chapter 3 

Me, Myself, & A Ranger

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"Well, you certainly handled that well."

I didn't bother to open my eyes. I already knew I was dreaming again. I was far too painless to still be awake.

"Since when do figments of my subconscious know how to use sarcasm?" I groaned, not moving from where I lay flat on my back on what felt like soft grass.

"Since you do, obviously." The voice replied with a little dash of a smile, as if it was the silliest question in the world.

"I don't suppose you're here to tell me how the hell I managed to get from the college campus to the middle of a nightmare forest, are you?"

"Well being, in your words; 'a figment of your subconscious', I can't know anything that you don't. So no, I'm afraid I can't tell you that."

I groaned again and rubbed my hands over my still closed eyes, "Wonderful, then this conversation is already pretty damn pointless then."

"That's rather rude. At least you have someone to talk to now. Haven't you been wishing for days now?"

"A sarcastic and unhelpful second personality isn't exactly what I had in mind." I snapped, "Maybe I've finally started going crazy."

"Lets hope not, that would be bad for the both of us." The voice hesitated for a moment as if she was thinking, and I could almost feel her eyes on me. "Are you going to just lie there for eternity? Or are you going to get up and do something?"

"Like what?"

"Wake up?" She suggested, "Or you could keep talking to me. We could ponder your intriguing nature of your predicament together."

"No thanks."

"Why not?"

"Because so far you haven't said anything remotely helpful." I said snippily.

"Well, maybe you just haven't asked the right question."

I paused for a moment to contemplate this.

"There's no point in me talking to you. You're not real. You're just a trauma induced invention of my subconscious, at best. You can't help."

"Even so, you don't have to be so harsh about it. I was just making a polite suggestion."

"And I can't remember asking for your opinion," I replied sharply, and then added tiredly, "Whoever the hell you are."

There was a ghostly chuckle and the sound of rustling on the grass next to me,"Well, why don't you just open your eyes and find out?"

I sighed. I didn't really care about who I was talking to really. I knew I was just dreaming, and in theory I could just wake myself up in an instant, if I wanted to. But either way, that would still require opening my eyes. So, reluctantly I allowed my eyelids to slowly open…

And I found myself staring directly into my own face.

My figment — or whatever she really was — had the exact same oval face, with the exact same full mouth, narrow chin, small nose, and wide almond shaped eyes as me. Her hair was admittedly longer and better kept, tumbling all the way down to her waist, but it was exactly the same shade of chestnut brown as mine. If I had been standing, I was be willing to bet my life that the two of us were within a centimetre's difference in height.