In these flashbacks, I feel everything. I can hear the sounds and feel the pain as real as if I was going through it in the moment, sometimes worse. I forget that I already went through them and survived. The first one is the oldest one. It was back when I was thirteen, and had just come to the Lost Cities. Elwin was shocked when me and Dex had to hail him to Moonglade  because I accidentally burned my hand on quintessence. He isn’t surprised anymore when I have to hail him with a weird new injury. The longer we wait for him, the more current the burn feels. Like a thousand needles are stabbing my hands. Please don’t see my crying, please don’t see me crying, please don’t see me crying. I beg in my head as he hangs up the imparter.
“What happened? What star did you try to bottle? What made you choose that one? Why did it hurt you? Are you ok? This isn’t normal!” The words come out of Dex’s mouth a mile a minute.
“I don’t know! You’re supposed to be helping me!” He looks taken aback. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to yell, but this really hurts.”
“No, it’s ok,” she says. I think he wanted to say more, but just then, Elwin leaps here.
“LORI FOSTER WHAT HAPPENED? DEX JUST HAILED ME OUT OF THE BLUE AND SAID THAT YOU BURNED YOUR HAND BOTTELIN STARLIGHT! HOW DID YOU GET HURT DOING ONE OF OUR SAFEST ACTIVITIES?!”
“I don’t know what I did. I just tried to bottle the light, and it burnt me!” I say.
“What star was it from?” Dex asks.
“Elementine.” I say
“Hm. I’ve never heard of that one.” Elwin says as he smears a balm on my hands. “But I graduated years ago, and if it’s not commonly used in medicine, I probably would have just forgotten.”
“No, I’ve never heard of it either. Maybe they teach you about it in the elite levels?” Dex suggests. Elwin wipes off the goo, and reveals some very painful burns. My eyes water again at the look of concern on his face. “I’ll be right back with something stronger.” He says.
“Does it hurt?” Dex asks.
“No, the balm numbed it, but it looks like that’s all it did.”
“I’m sorry I let this happen to you.”
“It’s not your fault.”
“But I feel like I should have done something more.”
“Don’t worry about it. We’re best friends, right?”
“Best friends?”
“If you want to be.”
“Yeah!” He says. Could he possibly know how cute that look on his face was? “I’ve never had a best friend before.”
“Me neither.” We’re quiet for a moment, then Elwin gets back. He wipes my hands off again, and the burning comes back. But then he smears another balm on them, and this one smells way worse. But it at least numbs it again. “What’s in this?” I ask.
“Better you don’t know. Just wash your hands really well tonight.” He says. What do I have on my hands? Wait, why is everything dissolving? Oh, I’m having flashbacks. The burn healed right away after the second balm, and I forgot all about it. Now I’m in the void, waiting for the next flashback. I panic as I recognize the new scene forming. Please don’t make me live through this again! I’m in the cave at Havenfield. I just found out that Biana had only reached out to me because Alden told her to. Was it the same for Fitz? I thought they actually wanted to be my friends. I throw a rock in frustration. It seems to happen in slow motion. Someone grabs me from behind, and he shoves a cloth over my mouth before I can scream. There must be a sedative on the cloth, because it feels harder to move… I can’t think right…
“Lori?” I try to warn Dex to run, but with the cloth over my mouth, I can’t make any real sounds. His eyes widen when he sees me, then they grab him too! No! They can’t… can’t… I must have blacked out, because what seems like only a second later, I’m in a chair in a dark room. I try to move my arms, but they’re tied up. My brain is still moving slowly from the sedative, and it’s hard to figure out what I should do. Transmit! Right, I’ll just send a message to Fitz that I’m in trouble! FITZ! FITZ! FITZ!
“She’s transmitting!” Someone behind me says. A man in a cloak with a hood over his face steps into my line of vision.
“You’d better stop that.” His voice gives me chills. “I’m giving you a chance to cooperate.” FITZ! I keep transmitting. If I stop, he might not hear me.
“She’s still doing it!” The first man says.
“Well, now she can’t say we didn’t give her a chance.” He grabs my wrists, and his hands seem to heat up, the temperature rising, rising, rising until it burns! I cry out in pain. It hurts so much, I can’t concentrate enough to keep transmitting. “Feel like cooperating?”
“Who are you?”
“That’s not important. What I want to know is who are you?”
“Why did you take me?”
“I want to know what you’re hiding in that powerful brain of yours.”
“I’m not hiding anything!”
“You clearly know something, or you wouldn’t have been able to find Elementine.” Did they set me up for that?
“Why did you take Dex? He isn’t hiding anything, and I know that.”
“That boy who walked in on us? He was a complication. We were supposed to just take you, but he had terrible timing. Keep asking questions, and we’ll be forced to kill him.”
“NO!” It slips out. But they CAN’T kill Dex. I can’t see for sure, but I think he smiles. Before that reaches my brain, he tells the other man to go get the boy.
“Awake?” The other man asks.
“Hm, yes. I think that will help her cooperate.” My foggy mind takes a second to comprehend the meaning of his words. They’re going to hurt Dex to get me to give them information I don’t have.
“I swear, I don’t know anything! I don’t know how I found Elementine!”
“But you did. And I need to know what else you’re hiding!” Before I can respond, the other man comes back, half dragging Dex. He looks so defenseless, it breaks my heart. He shouldn’t be here. I shouldn’t either, I think.
“Lori…?” He mumbles when he half opens his eyes.
“Dex…” It’s all I can do to stop myself from crying. I need to start acting like I know what I need to do. Nobody can enter my mind. I am in control here.
“What are you hiding?” He asks, as the other man, who is also wearing a cloak that conceals his identity, props Dex up against a wall.
“I’m not hiding anything.” I say, hoping I sound calm. My resolve melts when he grabs Dex’s wrists. Dex screams in pain, and a sob escapes my throat. It’s my fault he’s here. He was cpmming to check on me.
“I’ll ask one more time. What did the Black Swan hide in your head?”
“Why do you think I’d know that? If there really is anything important in my brain, they must have hidden it so well even I can’t find it.” He looks taken aback at these words.
“Drug them again.” He says.
“NO!” I try to resist the sedative as the cloth goes back over my mouth, but… but…
“...wake up, Lori.” I must have blacked out again.
“Hm?” My eyes won’t open.
“Come on. I’m getting you out of here.” I can’t leave yet. Why can’t I leave yet?
“Wait…”
“What?”
“Dex!” That’s why I couldn’t leave.
“You kids… FINE! I’ll get him.” The new man carries us out, and I awkwardly try to hold on so he doesn’t drop Dex. My eyes still won’t open when we seem to be outside. He sets us down next to each other, and I try to scoot closer to him. “Eat this.” He says, placing… something in my mouth. It tastes vile, but I swallow it. My mind starts to swirl more, and I realize that it was another sedative.
“No…” I moan.
“I’m sorry. But this is for your own good.” I lean my head on Dex’s shoulder and black out. My consciousness is coming back, but… oh, right. That all happened years ago. The two men who were burning us were Brant and Gethen, and the one who saved us was Mr. Forkle. And he only sedated us so he could heal the burns on our wrists. And of course the flashback ended before I kissed Dex. I wouldn’t mind living through that again. But I have to smile. The new scene forming is a happy one.
I sat in a carriage in Atlantis, sitting next to Dex. I was almost bursting with excitement. This was our first official date since we got back to the Lost Cities. We stopped at a diner, and he helped me out. We go inside, and find a table.
“What can I get for you?” A waiter asks us.
“I’ll have the brattails and a lushberry juice.” Dex says.
“And I’ll have the carnissia root with a lushberry juice.”
“I’m glad you came with me.” He says.
“Thanks for asking me out.”
“Anytime. You know, I’ve liked you since you first came to the Lost Cities. I just wish I could have had the guts to ask you out before…” He trails off, I guess not wanting to recount the horrors we went through while we were kidnapped.
“Hey, we made it through, and we’re on a date now. That’s what’s important.”
“Yeah.” He smiles, but I notice him rubbing his side.
“What’s wrong?”
“What?”
“You’re rubbing your side.”
“Oh.” He stops. “It’s nothing.”
“It’s not nothing. You’re not a great liar.”
“I guess I can’t hide anything from you.”
“Don’t try to change the subject.”
“Let’s not talk about it here. I promise to tell you later. But I want tonight to be happy, without us feeling sorry for each other and what we had to go through.”
“Fine, but I will hold you to that.”
“Here’s your food.” The waiter says when she comes over. Dex swipes his treasury cube, and we start eating.
“This is all so good.” I say.
“Try one of my brattails.” Dex says, offering me one. It tastes amazing.
“Now you try the carnissia root.”
“Mmmm…”
“The way your whole face lit up when I gave that to you was adorable.”
“Not as adorable as you. Sorry that sounded so cheesy.” I laugh.
“I don’t mind.” We finish our food and order custard bursts for dessert. Somehow, we started having a competition to see who could give the cheesiest compliment while we waited.
“You smell better than freshly baked mallowmelt.” Dex tries.
“Your smile lights up a room better than a thousand balefire lamps.” I fire back. It’s hard to tell who’s winning. We’re both laughing so hard, we can barely keep from laughing long enough to give the next compliment.
“I would hug the verminion to be with you.” He says with mock heroism.
“Now that’s a good one.”
“I know. I really want to kiss you right now.” He says.
“A kiss doesn’t sound like a bad idea.” I say and we lean in. When our lips meet, it feels just as magical as it did last time. Maybe even more. We pull apart a second before the waiter comes back out with our dessert. It tastes soooo good. Everything about it is just perfect. I’m so happy. Wait, what's going on? Everything is- oh, right. This all happened years ago. Well, it was nice to live through it again. Everything was so much simpler back then. A new scene starts forming. What is this? I'm at the opening ceremony before I started level 3. NO! What did I do to trigger this memory?