Memories - King's Return (Wakfu): The Hub

Chapter #40 - Dreams

Ralo sat in the cell in silence. He was going to be here for a while, so he repositioned himself to lay flat in a more comfortable position. He supposed that this was what he really deserved anyway, so he didn't fight being here either. Even if he was here for a lifetime, he wouldn't care. Until someone dealt with Coilcarairianmeianzenmarlei, he was a dangerous, aggressive, unpredictable creature anyway.

He knew that his face had been stained by crying by now. It was hard to accept that he would have tried to harm Tuto under any circumstance. It wasn't she was just going to forgive him.

He brushed the bangs of curly hair that parted in the middle of his face to the side. He distracted himself with the fact that his hair had gotten much longer than he last checked and with other such facts that just seemed to disconnect you with reality.

It had already been three days, or at least it was to Ralo's knowledge. It was at least three times he had managed to rest for some time. Rest was an interesting term though, considering that his dreams consisted of either torturous memories of the past or dark foretellings of what the forgotten part of his brain imagined. This had always been a problem his whole life, even when he was only an oblivious eight-year-old having the time of his life before all of the Eliatrope children were sent to Emrub.

Even then he had a prophecy of meeting Elmen, though it had a few endings in his dreams. Every time he would dream about his thirteenth birthday, it began peacefully until a person he today would recognize as Q approached him and offered a deal he had always wanted as an ambitious child. The ability to go into a more focused Wakfu training than the school provided was his fantasy at the time and when Q offered it to him, he accepted it without thinking about it twice. After accepting it though, Q would look down at him disgusted and began to attack him. Despite his best effort, each time he would be caught in a position he couldn't escape from and Q brought out a charm that resembled a flower. This charm began to take his wakfu until he passed out in the dream and he would wake up in real life.

This dream was one of Ralo's biggest fears and even later, the idea of what ended up happening would scare him beyond pure shock at the irony. This dream would make him afraid of sleep in general and afraid of the future. Ralo preferred to stay in a never changing loop than in a schedule that would change every day. The ability to know what would happen in the future was something he longed for, but only to a limit.

The dream would occur in his life on his thirteenth birthday. He had forgotten about it for a long time, on the other hand, because the children were sent to Emrub when he was twelve. Ralo, though, learned much more about fighting after the very first time he dreamt of the meeting and wouldn't get caught so easily when the day came. He woke up that day and carefully observed every person around him until he came across Q. His literal nightmare stood before him and they fought hard. Ralo would never be captured, and the moment Q brought out the cursed flower charm, he ran for his life. He made it deep into the forest that night and cried.

As he cried in horror at what almost happened to him, having barely escaped his inevitable death, having Elmen come to him and offer him shelter was a blessing. If only he would have thought first, he would have noticed many things like how Elmen couldn't have been an Eliatrope because of age or how the deal was so sketchy in the first place. Despite this, parentless, desperate Ralo accepted a place to be and wouldn't regret working for the Torntam until his scarf was removed. He didn't even know.

The Torntam was a comforting place for Ralo when he worked there. He met Tuto, ate three meals a day, and studied his favorite thing in the Krosmos, medicine, in a safe environment. He never knew why the day when he left why Q was so urgent or wanted to leave at all. It didn't make sense to him. Elmen was never rude to Q or himself and he never had anything against the Torntam when he offered Ralo freedom. Ralo really did wish that he could ask Q why he was so against Elmen suddenly and why he Ralo with him when he fled.

It didn't really matter now, though. Ralo sat in the cell, tired of living the past days purely in thought. He was a very work-oriented person in the first place, so doing nothing just made him feel like he was wasting something. If only he could do something in this prison.

In boredom, Ralo turned on his side and attempted to sleep. He had nothing better to do and was already tired. When he walked in, he figured that Xenlyr would bring him food regularly as not to starve him, but he had only gotten one meal on the first day so far.

He eventually fell asleep even with his never-ending spiral of thoughts causing wreckage in his mind.