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[hider=A Memory]
[color=74737a]"You knew this was happening."[/color]

It was a question, but it was also a statement. His mom knew the answer. There was a lilt to her voice, a small part of her that was begging him to say anything else, anything that wasn't the truth. His head remained in his hands as the words fell on him. He already knew how she looked right now, he didn't need to see it again. Her green eyes swollen from bawling, her skin the sallow color people got when things like eating and sleeping weren't important anymore. All he could and would see right now were her sneakers as she stood facing him, his wet eyes turning them into blurs against the white tile. 

[color=74737a]"Alex."[/color]

He squirmed. This would all be easier if she just yelled at him. He hoped she would. Like this was another D on a test or some stupid sandwich bag with weed in it. All of that felt dumb and it felt even dumber now, some distant things done by a stupid kid at some point before this. This was serious, this was unforgivable. If he was a stupid kid then and in every year leading up to ninth grade, then he was the dumbest, stupidest kid alive right now.

[color=cccccc]"Mhmmph,"[/color] he mumbled. She took another step towards him and the already stagnant atmosphere of the hospital tightened, like it was choking him. The step was gentle, too, a careful movement made by someone not wanting to scare him off, not wanting to make another scene or shouting match or another week of running away to a friend's house and picking up where their fights left off on the phone. She thought he'd do it. She really thought he'd fucking do it. But she wasn't wrong, he knew, she had all the evidence in the world to know her second child was a total fuckup who would run away after having her first child take a fistful of pills and tape a goodbye note to the fridge next to the baby pictures.

Another step. Slower, more cautious. Wary, even. [color=74737a]"You knew what those kids at school were doing to your brother and you didn't tell anyone."[/color]

Another statement that crashed on his lap. Another horrible thing he couldn't deny. What could he even say? 

[color=cccccc]"I,"[/color] he croaked. Even that single noise was hard to shove out. He swallowed hard enough that it hurt, and took a deep breath. 

[color=cccccc]"I didn' knowwwit wassthatbad."[/color]  

A third step. Rougher. [color=74737a]"Every day! For four years! It was [i]on[/i] the [i][b]note![/b][/i]"[/color] Her voice was getting louder. She stopped herself, until she could manage a hushed tone. [color=74737a]"All those bullies at school, all the bruises the doctors found on him... all the [i]cuts[/i]..."[/color] what air remained in her sputtered out, leading into the quiet sob of someone who'd cried so much tears couldn't come out anymore. 

He squirmed and tightened around the hard seat even more until it felt like his bones would snap. He wished they did. [color=cccccc]"I'did'n know,"[/color] he blubbered. [color=cccccc]"I'didn thingit would, I didn' know he, I..."[/color]
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[center]***[/center]
[color=cccccc][i]I don't know.[/i][/color] 

The words draped themselves over both sides of every parchment Alex took notes in, rocking in tandem to the flickers of candlelight that followed him late into the night. His eyes had spent hours wandering along the labyrinth of documents he'd taken from the guild advisor, losing themselves over and over again in between the black hedgerows of ink. This was a lot more difficult than he intially thought. Talking was easy, approaching others was easy. It was the reverse, the analysis, the understanding, the listening, that was hard. This had all been the latter, a one-way conversation between him and those presumed missing or worse.

He'd been in a situation similar to this. Clutching his brother's bony hand, asking himself the difficult questions, trying to draw the right conclusions. The years after that were heavy, only lightened by the eventual talks of video games and LARP campaigns Alex feigned interest in. But the memories never faded, and his family or his brother's friends never forgot. Even in the world of Pariah did the stares of his brother's friends carve their way into him. It didn't matter how many layers of extravagant armor or fantasy crafting tchotchkes were between them, he'd always be the stupid kid who smoked cigarettes in the school bathrooms, the poser who thought he was some kind of artist, the one who ignored his brother until it was almost too late.  

He woke up with a startle. He must've fallen asleep at some point, predictably. Facing him was a crude drawing of a pair of eyes he had no recollection of ever making. He stared, and they stared back. He averted his gaze out of instinct.

He dragged himself out of his dorm chair, and a piece of parchment stuck to his cheek through drool fluttered along with him. He peeled it off, gave it a quick inspection, then added it to a messy pile. 

[color=cccccc]"Mmh..[/color] [color=#87c735][i]shit.[/i]"[/color]

[center]***[/center]

His body's initial groans of protest diminished with the walk to the Laughing Worg, as the barrage of thoughts concerning the case took priority over everything else. Knowing he was late only minimized the aching even further. If his party couldn't prevent the loss of more wayfarers, they could at least discover the answers needed to be the voice of those who no longer had one. It was a strange goal, but as someone who had nearly lost a family member, he knew every name on paper was a person with a similar story, one with people who loved them. 

His brisk walk transitioned into a hard shove of the tavern doors, one arm clutching the small yet important stack of documents he'd picked to analyze. He'd taken the most important of his findings with him, folded and shoved in the middle of the stack in an attempt to conceal it from any prying eyes. 

[color=#87c735]"Crap, sorry I'm late!"[/color]

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