2021-07-23: Childhood's Dream

• Cutscene:
• Cast: Emeralda Kasim
• Where: New Kasim City
• Date: July 23, 2021
• Summary: Emeralda makes a personal decision to move forward with her life.

'After my daughter, left behind...'

It wasn't Kim talking in the recording, but it struck Emeralda just the same, like a blow out of nowhere. She sunk down, hugging her knees with her arms and very still.

She still couldn't remember everything. She remembered Kim plain as day, of course, and the old Elly a little less well - she had came to visit, but she wasn't working in there day in and day out. But she couldn't remember everything else. No matter how hard she tried, here, in the ruins of a city that bore her name, she couldn't. She didn't know why she had gone to sleep. She didn't know what had happened to Kim. She didn't know what had happened to anybody.

It hadn't bothered her, before. Not while she had family.

'It's hard to remember too far back. It's just a dream. I don't need to know about that.'

'You don't need to -- '

Xantia hadn't understood why Emeralda didn't need to know. She was the only other person Emeralda knew who didn't have her memories in the same way, and it mattered to her. But not to Emeralda. Why? It wasn't because Emeralda didn't care for Kim as much as Xantia cared about her past. She loved him. It was just...

Emeralda did not have a reason. And that hurt, more than it ever had before.

'I promise, I won't leave you alone that long again.'

'But people aren't just their memories. What you know already is precious, and whatever happened - whatever the truth is behind Kim, or Fei... But what I think is important is to remember that the memories you make NOW are important too.'

Neither Fei nor Elly seemed to mind. Emeralda hadn't worried about her past because it wasn't going anywhere. She hadn't worried about the future because it would get here when it got here. She'd just... lived, without focusing much on any time but Right Now.

And that was fine, for years. But it wouldn't be fine forever, and she was starting to run into forever.

'This child... holds our futures and possibilities...'

She was still Kim's child. She loved him with all her heart, even if they'd never spoken as much as she'd spoken to Elly, or Fei, or even most of the Wolves. Fei wasn't him, not really, and she knew it - just as close as existed anymore. But maybe...

Maybe she could find out who he really was. Where he'd come from. What this place was, and why. If people couldn't tell her, she would find out herself. She already liked adventures. It wouldn't be very hard to start learning from them, to enter with a goal. She could become a Drifter for real, not just the play version she'd been.

Maybe she could find out why she was different.

Maybe she didn't need people to take care of her quite so much.

Maybe it was time to grow up.