Disclaimer: I do not own KHR in any way, shape, or form.
Author's Note: See bottom.
OoO
Alaude was annoyed.
Alaude was very annoyed.
He had come out expecting to have a nice, quiet training ground, perfect for a good bout of stress-releasing training. The last person he wanted to see- which, to be fair, would be anyone he saw at the moment- was the weakling's relative.
And the brunet dared to address him so flippantly?
He felt rage building inside him, and his restlessness only added to the flame. For a minute, all he could see was red, and so he subtly changed his body language to offense. He saw the man across from him change his body language too. He bared his teeth and-
He closed his eyes and forced his snarling temper down, replacing it with cool indifference. He was above such matters. He would not be controlled by his temper as he had so often been in his past. He opened his eyes and stiffly walked away from the wary man.
OoO
Had- had Alaude just walked away from a fight?!
Lambo stared, dumbfounded, as the skylark, who was fairly vibrating with untapped energy, walked away, heading towards the far end of the training field until he could no longer see him.
Well.
That was different.
Hib-
Nope. Nopenopenope.
He mimicked the blond's previous actions and shut his eye, forcing his memories down until he could no longer see them.
He sighed and leaned against his tree, feeling the rough bark dig into his bandages. He swore under his breath and eased away from the rough surface, feeling pain run up and down his back. He maneuvered himself so he was lying on his stomach in the grass. It was, despite his ribs, the most comfortable position to be in.
He sighed again and turned his head to look at the blades of grass, musing upon his methods of coping. He knew that it wasn't healthy to do push everything down. It would explode and hurt others around him.
Perhaps it was time to come to terms with their… Passing.
He didn't want to forgive and forget, nor did he think he could. But he knew he should accept it, at least.
It wasn't as if he hadn't accepted it, per se. He knew that they were- they were- dead. He knew that they weren't coming back, and that there would be no more smiles or laughs or fighting. He also knew that he hadn't actually come to terms with it. He avoided thinking about them, to the point where he didn't even let himself think their names.
Perhaps it was time to explore the memories. In doing so, he would open his wounds, (hopefully, but not probably, because he was far from a master in the mind arts) clear out the infection, and stitch back up neatly. Then, when he had a relatively sound mind, he could leave Italy and carve out a living for himself somewhere.
He found himself surprised by the tinge of regret that surfaced at the thought.
He supposed it would make sense that he didn't want to leave. This place, these people, they were a connection to his happier times. If he left, he left the only remnant of his past. Future. Whatever.
But he had no right to play god here and try to prevent things from happening. These were people, not just distant figures in history. He had already changed things enough. Distantly, he wondered how the attack had happened in his timeline.
Lambo exhaled loudly and tried to settle into a meditative state. He tuned out any background noise and focused on the steady inhale and exhale of his breaths. Gradually, his eyes slipped close and he entered his mindscape.
The dismal view of his mindscape almost made him reconsider. But he was a stubborn ass, if anything. He would go through with this or further wreck his mindscape trying.
Sighing, he turned to a random spot in the wall and summoned his flames, forming a triangle on the tips of his fingers. Then, he crouched and plunged it into the bottom of the hallway. He dragged it up, left, and down, and the space glowed green for a moment before an empty space. The door would lead to a random memory since he didn't specify, but he did make a frame of time. It wouldn't do to bring up memories that wouldn't bring closure.
He stepped into the room. Suddenly, he was in a small body at the dining table with the rest of his family. The room was quiet, and the others were viciously cutting into their steaks.
"Tsunaaaaa." He heard himself whine. Viewing memories was an extremely odd experience. One would exist on a purely parasitic level. You would have echoes of the emotions you had at the time without actually feeling them and sense what they sensed. You could hear your thoughts and know the reasoning behind it. Obviously, you couldn't change the way you acted.
"Yes, Lambo?" Tsuna said, his voice showing just a bit of strain. His eyes focused on him, and there were large bags under his exhausted eyes, but they were as warm as always. His seven year old self felt so keyed up and anxious that he completely disregarded this. After all, Tsuna- not Tsuna-nii, since they were in Italy now and Reborn would kill him if he mixed languages- had been wearing that look for months. But Lambo was sure that they would come out on top; after all, Tsuna could do anything!
But now that the gaze was focused on him and him alone, he doubted his plan. But no! His self-indulgence reared up with indignation. They hadn't gone out on a trip to that awesome sweet shop in weeks! An injustice that demanded retribution! Still, his voice was only a little higher than a mumble when he said, "Can we go to-"
Suddenly, Gokudera swung his gaze to the child and snarled, eyes spitting fire. His lips were pulled back into a deep frown, and bags of the same size as his boss' hung beneath his eyes. "Stupid cow, can't you see that Tenth is exhausted? Besides, your stupid sweet tooth should be satisfied by all the cookies you've been sneaking from the kitchen. Don't be so selfish!" Lambo's eyes went wide with hurt, but his lips weren't trembling and his eyes just got dust in them or something! Tsuna shot the Storm Guardian a sharp look. Gokudera sighed and tried to tamp down his temper, but made no move to apologize.
"Lambo, don't take it personally. The last few weeks have been rather stressful for us all, and we haven't gotten much sleep. But when it is bit safer, I promise I'll take you, alright?"
Lambo sniffled a bit and nodded silently. They resumed eating.
And with that, he was spit out of the memory. He stumbled a bit and fell on his ass, trembling. He etched their faces into his mind with desperation. Silent tears slid down his face from the freshness of the memory, and he took a few minutes to gather himself.
His limbs trembled like a newborn colt's when he stood up; all the same, he made a door and entered a memory. And another, and another, until he had gone through at least fifteen other memories. He was mentally exhausted and his mindscape showed it by trembling as if there was a great earthquake. It came in different spurts, but it still cracked some of the tiles every time it shook.
He shut his eyes and leaned against a wall. When he had recovered enough to open his eyes, he saw that while the tiles were cracked, they weren't melting anymore. Just rows upon rows of black and white tiles.
He smiled briefly; that was a good thing, a sign of healing.
But he still had a lot of memories to go through and a lot of time to do it. He groaned and moved to cut out a door. However, when he stepped through, no image appeared. Instead, he was spit back into the hallway.
"What on earth...?" He asked aloud, staring quizzically at the door. Once again, he entered, but was met with the same results. Now he was getting frustrated. Frowning, he summoned the memories of his mind lessons to the door instead of whatever memory it had been. He stepped through and was immediately transported to his smaller self.
It wasn't a lesson that explained what the hell that empty memory meant, but it did clear the theory that he had just overused his door.
For an hour, he continued to speed through the memories of the lessons until he reached the correct one.
Chrome stood at the front of a classroom, but only Lambo, I-Pin, and Fuuta were in the desks. The other Guardians had missions or something.
"Since you have already organized your mindscape, I'm going to teach you how to summon your memories at will, without going through all of them." She said. The trio was always quiet during her lessons; she was naturally soft-spoken, so they couldn't be loud or they wouldn't hear her. "This method will be unique to you and the environment of your mindscape. Please keep in mind that you cannot change the method as you grow older unless your mindscape drastically changes.
"Fuuta, what did you say your mindscape was?" The boy looked up from his notes and thought for a moment.
"It's kind of like a giant library, only with photo albums. That's where the common memories are, but the precious ones are in the ceiling, which is actually like a galaxy, sort of."
"Do you have a method in mind?"
"I thought that I could use an index that was like my ranking book. I could, um, write something down and it would search through the relevant books and sort of float them out."
"That's a good head start, Fuuta, but you need to remember that memories are fickle things. You have to be very specific or it will bring out more memories than you can manage." The boy nodded thoughtfully and scribbled down a few things.
"I-Pin, what was yours?"
"It is an empty dojo with training dolls." She paused for a second, trying to find the right word. She had been nearing completion of the Japanese language when they had moved, and to say that she was frustrated when she learned that she had to learn another language was an understatement. However, they had access to the best tutors, so she was picking it up much faster than she would have. "I thought I could… Use a kata and make the memories appear?"
"That's very clever. But how would you know which kata to use?" She turned to Lambo. "What have you come up with?"
"I will summon a door that leads to the memory! There aren't any doors, but Lam- I am sure that I can make it work!"
Chrome sighed and said, "You will have to have at least a fragment of the memory you're looking for. Which doesn't work with hidden memories."
The eight year old wilted. Fuuta, a bit frustrated, asked, "Can you tell us your method, then?"
Twenty minutes later, the trio had developed suitable methods.
"Now that that's done, I have something all of you need to know. As you get older, it is inevitable that you will forget things. There is no way to stop this, and no way to remember it. The memories are gone forever. Your mindscape, as you might remember, is merely a construct of your mental and physical energies, made possible by your Flames. But your brain is still a brain, made to disregard unimportant things to make room for new memories. Your mindscape just makes it easier to remember."
With that, he was promptly ejected from the memory. Was that what was happening? But it still existed, but it was like it had been… Blocked? Stolen? Siphoned away?
Only the Mist Flame was capable of doing this, but Daemon wasn't skilled enough to block memories. He turned the problem over and over in his head, but no solutions popped up.
He wandered through the black and white halls, having no particular purpose in mind. Sighing, he put his problem on the backburner and decided to examine his outer walls.
As he approached the door, he began to experience an odd feeling. Not a feeling that said danger! turn back!, but just… Odd.
He cautiously wandered further down the hall and was met with the peculiar sight of orange light shining through the cracks of the tiles. He stared at it for a moment, his mind going completely blank as he tried to remember how to speak.
"Holy hell…" Was all that came out. As soon as he regained his bearings, his mind worked furiously. The only person who could (but wouldn't) do this was Giotto.
Was this the cause of his blocked memories?
Almost in a trance, his mind screaming his stupidity, he reached out to touch the light.
Sky Flames…
Too warm, too bright, too kind to be anything else. And then he jerked back as if burned.
Too soon, too soon… The foreign voice echoed in his mind, female and gentle. In good time, Lambo-kun. You'll be fine; I promise.
With that, he was firmly booted out of his own mind.
OoO
His eyes jerked open and immediately shut due to sudden onslaught of light. He took deep, shuddering breaths, and was filled an irrational anger tinted with fear.
How could that… That… Person just boot him out of his own mind? (Who could do such a thing?)
And what the hell did they mean, all in good time?! (Why?!)
Some stupid promise… (A foolish one, too. Things will never be all right.)
He calmed himself down and winced. Deep breaths didn't go with cracked ribs.
Slowly, carefully, he pushed himself up and stood, though his legs wobbled. His ankle also protested. He pushed down the pain with practiced ease and frowned down at his stomach. It gurgled for lunch, but he was craving sweets as he always did when something unsettled him. Wryly, he wondered why this didn't happen before he fainted.
He made his way back to mansion, pausing every now and then to rest, because after the Flames had kicked him out, his focus hadn't been very good and a bit of pain kept slipping past his blocks. Once he reached the door, he cautiously peeped inside to make sure no one watching, then slipped in.
He made his way to a kitchen by trial and error, and, after making sure that no one was there, slipped inside to rummage through the pantries. He found a lot of raw ingredients, but nothing sweet that he could eat.
But just as he was giving up hope, he found a small hoard of chocolate bars in a cabinet with a false bottom. Just as he was eagerly reaching for them, a thought came to mind:
What if these belonged to one of the Guardians?
He sighed heavily and retracted the limb, replaced the false bottom, and closed the cabinet. He guessed he could go without…
He wandered out of the kitchen, not moping as he looked for a kitchen that could at least give him a strawberry or something. Lambo asked one of the servants, but he refused to speak to him, terrified that Edda might think of him as an accomplice.
He moved throughout the mansion until he stumbled across the Guardian, G. The pink-haired man scowled briefly then began walking away. Then Lambo remembered his true purpose.
"Hey! Do you happen to know where I can find something sweet?" He called out to the Storm Guardian's back. Judging by his stiffened shoulders, he heard him. And judging by his silence and unmoving figure, he was debating whether or not to actually answer his question.
"One left, two rights, third door on you right." He said gruffly. Then he walked away. Lambo felt a brief moment of cheer before it was buried under a manic need for sweets and an uneasiness he couldn't shake.
His mindscape had always been just that; his. No one could affect it except him, and no one could tell him what to do. No one could hurt him there; it was his haven.
But being show that he didn't have control there? It was, to put it mildly, unsettling.
But he tried to bury that in the bottom of the mind he wasn't sure he had complete control over and concentrate on finding that kitchen.
OoO
A/N: A wild PLOT appeared! What do you do?
Scramble madly to try and accommodate it.
Don't update for four days while trying to write and giving up every time. Then try to make up for it in word count and hope the readers don't kill you.
I am so, so sorry. Between my slight ADD, my lack of inspiration and a bunch of ideas, and my hectic sleeping schedule, I had a hard time getting this chapter into shape. Even then, I had to force myself to sit down and do this so I didn't freaking update a week late. It took six hours to write this chapter, and I can't say it's my best, but I did manage to defeat the wild PLOT.
On the other hand, this is chapter twenty, this story has been more popular than my wildest belief, and I have at least six chapters to go until the end. Probably.