The sounds of the woods spilled out of the pocket dimension before any color had returned. It filled Amelia with a tentative sense of calm before the scenery filled in around her and her jaw clenched once more. The gap in her memory had felt impossibly large and irreparable before today, and the memory she found herself in instantly brought back those feelings of frustration and helplessness as she instantly recognized the memory as the one glimpse into her past she had never been able to make sense of until now. With all of the missing pieces now forced perfectly into place, she understood the implications of what she had witnessed centuries ago all too well. The sudden realization made her stomach ache with nausea.
Amayeli quickly moved through the forest with her twin brother, Kanata, in tow. The two went at an odd half-run-half-walk pace as the barely older girl urged her brother onwards.
"Come on, Kanata!" She tried to accelerate to a running speed, but stopped momentarily to let her brother catch up. Once he came within grabbing range, she took him by the wrist and began pulling him along.
"Why do you want to go so far from the village, Ama?" Kanata questioned his sister, sounding more confused than irritated, though both tones were present as he was practically dragged through the woods.
"There's something to explore here, I just know it!" The small girl couldn't find the words to explain why she felt the need to go in the specific direction she felt a pull of curiosity from. Maybe it wasn't curiosity at all, it felt almost like the excitement she felt every time she came back from a trip and saw her mother or older siblings again. Whatever it was, it was calling to her, begging to be found by the girl.
Kanata didn't seem to understand Amayeli's reasoning, but he knew his sister. He was familiar with her sudden bursts of curiosity and energy. She had dragged him to many a place for them to explore, sometimes they were old ruins and other times they were beautiful landforms. As they began to close in on their destination, however, Kanata began to believe that this wouldn't be like any of their other adventures. Looking up to the sky, the small boy could see what remained of the smoke clouds that he had been watching with his older siblings merely a few hours earlier. "Ama, we're heading towards the smoke," he warned with a worried edge to his voice as he tried to pull away from his sister.
Amayeli's grasp didn't falter as she tilted her head up to look at the sky as well, noticing the dwindling streams of black smoke. "Huh, I guess we are," she lowered her gaze back to eye level and continued to push forward, dragging her brother along for the ride. Whatever this pulling sensation in her soul was, she was certain it was important and she wouldn't turn back because of a few measly wisps of smoke.
"Ama, listen," Kanata spoke again, his voice made louder by the urgency it held. "We could be going into a woodland fire, that's what the elders thought the smoke was earlier." He began to tug more harshly at their joined hands and dug his heels into the dirt to slow his sister down.
Both of the children halted, much to the surprise of the boy, who slammed into his sister at the sudden stop. The girl payed no mind to the collision and looked her brother in the eyes with an uncharacteristically serious expression carved into her face. "'Nata," she began, her harsh gaze prompting the boy to shrink in on himself slightly, "I know there's something over here, I don't know how I know, but I know. Besides, whatever that smoke is coming from isn't the woods itself, it smells too different. I've seen fires consume parts of woods before, and this does not look or smell like one of those fires." Amayeli turned once more to face forward, walking once more in the direction of the smoke. "Trust me, 'Nata," she did not look back at her brother as she pulled him along, speeding up to a run. This time, Kanata stayed quiet with his worries and followed behind his sister, giving their joined hands a squeeze.
The two continued to run through the lush woods, eventually coming to a dirt path that had been worn through the underbrush. Amayeli slowed to a walk and altered course to travel on the dirt path.
"That's weird," Kanata frowned down at the path, "I don't remember a path being over this way." It didn't look like a freshly made path, but there was no way it had been there for very long--otherwise he would have remembered it. How in the world did it get here?
There was silence for a brief moment before Amayeli looked back to meet her brother's eye once more. Her gaze was not as intimidating as it had been moments before, and she looked at him with a questioning expression that matched her tone as she spoke. "Is it weird that I think this looks familiar?"
Kanata shook his head with a sigh, "I mean, I guess not since your head is so screwed up."
"Hey!" Amayeli's features contorted in indignance, "My head is not screwed up!"
"Oh, really?" Kanata teased, "Mother says you hit it so hard that bits of your mind flew out."
"I did not! My mind is fine!" Amayeli shouted, yanking her brother's hand for emphasis. Kanata simply giggled in response to his sister's pout.
"Come on, you know I'm just joking around," he laughed, swinging their joined hands around as he went to walk beside his sister instead of behind her.
Amayeli gave a "hmph," in reply as she bumped into him sideways, knocking him to the side and almost off of the path. Kanata quickly regained his footing and gave her a playful scowl before shoving her with his own shoulder in retaliation. The two immediately burst into giggles and continued to playfully shove each other back and forth as they walked until their sides began to ache.
Soon, the children came upon the end of the path, paying more attention to their little game than what lay ahead of them. Amayeli gave Kanata a final shove, underestimating her strength and sending him stumbling sideways to the ground. The girl quickly went to help him up, only to falter when he directed her attention to something else.
"Oh, wow," The words fell from Kanata's mouth as he stared past Amayeli. She followed her brother's line of sight, her eyes falling on a scattering of buildings made from wood and earth. Amayeli felt her brother sit up beside her as they both stared at the new scenery.
This time, it was Kanata who took Amayeli's hand, pulling her up with him as he urged his sister forward. They walked towards the buildings in awe, realizing that two of the biggest structures had been set on fire a while before they had arrived. Charred skeletons were the only things left of the two structures that still released trails of black smoke into the sky. The few remaining flames were buried out of sight, only alerting the twins to their presence with their gluttonous crackling as they continued to consume what little of the buildings were left.
Amayeli absently slipped her hand out of her brother's grasp as she walked forward, passing one of the still-intact buildings to circle the remains of the closest burning building. Kanata went over to investigate the building she had passed without her, but Amayeli found herself unable to care. These buildings must have been the things that she had felt compelled to explore, so why did she feel that something was missing? The girl did a full visual scan of the burnt and collapsed remains of the building, having fully adjusted to her limited vision by now. She could still feel that pulling in her chest but, unlike before, there was no direction to follow. Amayeli was certain that there was something else she needed to find, there had to be, but it was nowhere to be found. What made everything even more frustrating was that the clearing seemed familiar, like she had seen it before -- she could even picture what the large buildings had looked like before they had been burned down. If her life depended on describing why or how, she would be dead where she stood, but she still couldn't shake the feeling. Her discomfort was written all over her face as she stood staring at what used to be the entrance to the large building.
A shout pulled her from her musings to quickly look around for her brother. She soon caught sight of him waving her over near the tree line to her right. There were two strange structures in the ground at his feet. Without wasting any more time, Amayeli began walking over to him. As she got closer, she realized that the things near her twin's feet were not structures at all, but circles of rocks surrounding patches of upturned ground.
"Look what I found!" Kanata exclaimed once his twin was close enough for him to show off his discovery. He stepped out from between the two circles, "What do you think they are? I think they look kind of like graves."
Amayeli walked forward a few more steps to stand beside her brother, looking down at the circles. After a moment of consideration, she shook her head, "No, they're too small, you can't lay someone down in that -- it's barely big enough for one of us to sit in the center."
Kanata gave a small pout, "Well what else could it be?" He frowned, carefully considering the two, ritual-like alterations of the ground.
Amayeli's brows drew together, nearly touching in her concentration. The circles were nearly perfect in shape -- clearly made with care -- and one was made with different colored rocks than the other, which she found odd. The one on the left was made with darker stones while the one in front of Kanata was made of lighter ones. Amayeli lowered herself to the ground, crouching down to inspect the dirt in the darker stone circle's center. Running a hand through the dirt proved it to be loose and pliant, a quick glance at the other circle showed it was identical.
"Looks like it was just dug up," Kanata voiced his sister's thoughts, crouching down beside her as she nodded in agreement. "But I didn't see anyone, did you?"
"No, I didn't," Amayeli shook her head. Even now, as she listened, she could not hear or smell anyone other than her twin and the critters that played beyond the tree line. The girl grabbed another handful of dirt, letting it fall through her fingers back down to the circle. A considering expression overtook her face before she let curiosity get the better of her.
"Woah, are you sure that's a good idea?" Kanata questioned his twin, worry and panic seeping into his tone.
Amayeli simply kept digging, brushing the dirt from the center outwards until a continuous mound of dirt formed near the boarder of rocks. "The only way to see if anything is here is to dig until we find something. If we don't find anything, then it must be some weird fire pit."
A distressed noise made its way from Kanata's throat, but he did not move to stop his twin. "Just be careful," he said, "I still think there might be a dead body, they could have just buried it upright instead of laying down."
The girl huffed, but felt something in the dirt before she could express her doubts. She froze, searching the dirt for a glimpse of color, when she saw nothing she began wiggling her fingers around to find what she had brushed over.
"What is it? Did you find something? If it's wet or bony please just leave it alone," Kanata begged, backing away as he braced for his sister to yank a dead limb out of the dirt.
To the surprise of both twins, Amayeli pulled a thin strip of an animal fiber, possibly leather, out of the ground. In her hand, the girl held the half-buried strip, carefully appraising it before giving it a final tug. Along with the rest of the string, a large charm popped out of the ground. Amayeli carefully brought the necklace to up to eye level as she wiped the dirt from the metal circle, her eyes drinking in every detail of the engraved symbol as it was revealed. It appeared to be rather simple, consisting of only three diamonds joined at one point to resemble a triangle, but it awed the girl regardless. As she turned her attention to the gemstones embedded in the metal around its edge, she felt a tug at her sleeve.
"Keep going!" Kanata encouraged his sister, his stance on digging up the circles having done a near one-eighty. "I want to see what else there is!"
Amayeli laughed and set the necklace aside, turning to face her brother, "Oh, really? Not scared of finding a dead body anymore?" She teased him with a smile, earning a pout and a shove to her shoulder in response. The girl just chuckled and went back to searching through the dirt. In her search, she found a knife and hatchet, as well as an ornate comb and a small, cloth toy resembling an odd looking bird. Both of the twins sat in silence as they inspected each of the treasures with awe.
Eventually, Kanata was the one to break the silence. "I can't imagine why anyone would just bury a bunch of nice things like this. Any ideas, Ama?" He turned to face his twin, but she showed no signs of having heard him.
The girl stared at the necklace in her hands, taking in the magical glow of the reddish, amber, and clear gemstones embedded in its metal charm around the triangle-like symbol. Unfortunately, it did little to distract her from the pulling sensation in her chest, which had only doubled with each uncovered treasure. There was something else she needed to find. A hand on her arm coaxed her out of her thoughts and she looked over to her twin, eyes widened, resembling a sense of surprise, as she gazed at him through a haze. "Hm?"
"Are you alright?" Kanata asked his sister, worry painting his features once more. "You've been off ever since we found this place."
Amayeli turned back to the necklace, "I don't know 'Nata." She rubbed at the metal face of the charm with her thumb to dislodge more of the dirt that still clung to its surface. A sigh escaped her as she dropped her hands back down onto her lap, looking back to Kanata. "It's just-, I brought us here because I could feel that there was something here we needed to find."
Kanata nodded his head, "And we found it--I mean--I've never seen anything like this before." He cracked a smile as he gestured to the buildings behind them.
"No!" Amayeli shook her head vehemently, "There's something else, I know there is... but I can't see anything else."
"Something else?" Her twin questioned, genuine confusion dominating his features.
"Something else, someone else, I don't know!" Amayeli threw her hands up in exasperation before bringing the necklace charm up to inspect it once more. "I thought for a moment that this might have something to do with it but now I don't know. The longer I think about it, the fainter the feeling gets."
"The necklace? Why?" Kanata tilted his head in confusion.
"I can see the magic aura it gives off, its like a blueish glow, can't you sense it?" Amayeli turned the necklace charm to show it to her twin.
Kanata nodded faintly, "I still don't understand why it would have anything to do with you finding something."
Amayeli's shoulders slumped, "I don't know, but the aura feels familiar."
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Finland forced out a slow breath, feeling another wave of tears pressing against the backs of his eyes. "They came back, you came back," he turned to Matthew, "you came back," he repeated. His eyes squinted slightly with restrained emotions and he lowered his head to focus his gaze on their joined hands, unable to watch his son's expression. "If only we had waited another day," Finland breathed, his voice choked with grief and hushed to a whisper, "We had just left for Greenland that morning."
Matthew felt his throat begin to close as tears clawed their way out of his tear ducts to well up in his eyes. Had he really been that close to getting his family back? If he had let his twin drag him out into the woods a few hours earlier, would they have a better life? A life with parents that actually watched over them instead of leaving them on their own while they traveled back to Europe? The tall blonde tried to say something, anything, to his mutsi, but found he could not manage to do more than open his mouth and choke on half-formed words.
Sweden watched forlornly as the image of his young daughter picked up the knife he had buried for her. Her close inspection and muted recognition of the knife--the way her fingers automatically curled around the handle in one practiced motion--sent shards of ice to burrow into his chest. As he watched his daughter, the miniscule shifting of a myriad of emotions on her face, he came to a realization that made his heart skip a beat. "'ey didn' use magic on her memories," the observation came out as a hushed murmur as his eyes widened and glazed with unfallen tears.
All eyes turned to him as the New World Siblings' friends and family tried to grapple with the possibility.
France looked down at his hands as he wrung them. Tentatively, he turned his gaze to rest upon the Nordics and his three children, "Do you really think that's possible? I mean, wouldn't she have remembered something by now since she sees all of you at least once a month anymore?"
Norway met France's eye, very little of his previous contempt being directed at the colonizer. He was simply too emotionally drained at the moment to project his anger outwards. "Who knows, memories are finnicky." Lukas fell silent for a moment, his brows furrowing in contemplation, "Though, I suppose... She said that she was looking for something else and couldn't find it, she might have been looking for us." The cold nation looked to his fellow Nordics, but it was not one of them who responded.
"It-It's entirely possible," Japan timidly spoke up, hoping to be of some use if he was going to be forced to watch the memories of the woman who had once been his friend. "It might also explain why she could not remember any of you. Her mind could have considered the memories traumatic because you were nowhere to be found when she looked for you. She likely didn't remember the incident that separated you because of her head injury, so when she could not find you her mind did not understand why and repressed the memories of you to cope." The Asian nation's voice grew stronger as he spoke, confidence seeping in when the Nordics and New World Siblings looked at him with serious consideration.
Diego nodded his head, cracking a small, bittersweet smile, "Well, that sure 'xplains that 'secret language' you guys had." He turned to his older brother, raising his fingers up to make air quotes.
Matthew stared at him for a moment before what he had said clicked into place, "Oh, right." He let a few chuckles slip out, "I forgot 'bout that."
Iceland leaned over the table to get a better look at Matthew, "Secret language?"
Matthew nodded his head, a small smile curving his lips. "Yeah, a year or so after all this," he gestured to the scene behind the rift, "Amelia re-taught me the languages we had used when we were with you guys. We used them to speak to each other when we didn't want our siblings to know what we were talking about, still do sometimes. The words are so old compared to what you guys speak now that I suppose they never caught on." He jabbed a thumb over at the Mexico twins, a small laugh escaping him.