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Jinhai felt as though he were moving through fog - a hazy dream stretched out in front of him, everything glassy and opaque. He was moving slowly, his legs feeling heavy, and everything was focused on that one person, that one being that he was linked to.

"Gale," he said again, trying in vain to catch his attention. But there was nothing, no reply.

Just a blank void in his head and his heart.

"Gale," said Jinhai again, this time louder, with more feeling. "Gale wake up you Jack damn brat - "

The spirits around him were children - or they took that appearance, at least, and he felt them watching, felt them staring. They were the ones who had caused this - they were the ones keeping them trapped in this...illusion.

This nightmare.

It was cruel, really. Giving him a taste of what he craved, a sharp, stabbing reminder of what he had once had so long ago. It wasn't real - it couldn't be real, and yet...he wanted it to be. Desperately he grasped for it, but he knew his fingers would not hold it for very long.

It was just a small taste. That was it. And if he did not get Gale to wake up, Jinhai had the distinct feeling that they would both be gone - and not just briefly.

He hated this.

Why did you do this to me? After all this time I had grown used to being what I was. Now you torment me by putting me back into this body that I lost so long ago - a body I scarcely even remembered - and for what purpose?

Why?

His hand lashed out again, but his fingers passed through the spirits. They were, of course, unfazed by his gestures, his pointless attacks, and stood where they were, just watching him and the rest.

"Gale! Gale wake up!"

He tried to remember things, but there was nothing there.

Gale, he tried - maybe thinking it, as he had for so long, would work better than his real voice, said out loud. Gale, wake up.

Silence.

"Gale," said Jinhai, and his voice was hoarse. It felt strange to his own ears, half muffled, a little stretched out and too thin, like water spread across sand, dissolving away as it came. He was not used to hearing it, not after so long, and it was odd, the same sort of discomfort as wearing a shirt with all the buttons in the wrong place.

"Gale," he said again, and his voice cracked a little on the last half, galling him. "Gale, you Jack damned b*****d, wake up - "

Still no reply. Jinhai felt frustration seeping into his veins, into his heart. If he could not get Gale to wake up, then they would both disappear, fall away into nothingness with no one to remember them.

Will you remember me if I am gone?

He did not want to be gone. Cowardly, he wished for that life again, the one trapped within another's mind, within a solid object, unable to do more than share his thoughts with someone else - a single person.

Isn't that better than being dead?

He looked down at his hands, pale skinned and scaled, hands he had not seen for so long.

I don't want to disappear.

Air.

He'd forgotten what air tasted like to some extent. The synapses of his bondeds' minds had not been enough for him to remember it fully. Air. He wasn't feeling what was inside of Cassandra's head. He wasn't feeling through her fingers. He was...

he was doing...

For a moment, Nicodemus had to stare down at his own hands, flexing his fingers. Long forgotten appendages. He'd held....someone...with those once. He tried to remember a person, a visage. A woman? He couldn't remember.

Still, there was something odd about it and after a moment, the thought of a woman caused him to look at the children...and then the singular female who was curled up on the ground, almost looking sick. He moved to reach out, touch Cassandra for what would be the first time... the only time. It was strange how much smaller she looked from the outside when he wasn't inside her head. How fragile, even.

"Cassandra." he spoke, his voice rough, firm. "Get up." Even from the outside he tried to force his way inside of her head. He'd woken someone before, how had that turned out? He'd said her name, shaken her shoulders...he'd....

"Cassandra." he repeated it, even as the vague shape of another woman - small like this one, full of life. Energy. It permeated his head, but only brushed the surfaces of Cass's mind, it didn't connect with her at all.

She wasn't moving. Was it the spirits? Was Cassandra blocking them out? Even from the inside he'd felt that panic, that hate, that raw FEAR that she responded to them with. Loathing, but unable to make them pull away from her. A resistance.

A coping mechanism perhaps? He didn't know, but he knew that in that moment there was something he could do, taking off his cloak and putting it over the dazed girl, brushing her hair behind her ear in an almost...adoring manner before he stood to turn and look at the wall of spirit children.

"Give her back." he said firmly - angry. He moved, seeming to only realize then he held the same weapon he held onto in life - a knife. It was sturdy, painful, even. However, even the stabbing motion he made with it seemed to pass through the children. Useless.

Even as he turned to look back at how..futile that had been, his eyes looked to his hunter. Yes. Cassandra was his. He'd chosen her.

He'd known the moment she walked through that door and into the room that she belonged to him. No, even before then. He'd known she was coming.

And these spirits couldn't take her away from him.

Not this one.

He pulled away from the wall of children to return to where he'd left Cassandra, to check. To see how she was holding up. He could see her burrowing into herself - and into his cloak. She was like a child, wrapping herself in some sort of false security she was letting herself be caught up in. How did he fix that?

How did he make it better?

The Tonberry sat, carefully cradling the girl in his arms - almost tenderly, brushing his fingers over her forehead. "Cassandra." he spoke her name again. It had always woken her before, in those mornings when she wrapped herself in the blankets and mumbled 'five more minutes' after her alarm went off. Nothing. He whispered her name again, his fingers pausing as they touched her hair.

Hey Nic-Nic. Do you think I'd look better with shorter hair?

I don't know, *******. You look refined with your hair long.

That's such a silly reason to keep it long, Nick! I should cut it. Short hair would make me look like an adult, see?

A woman. Fragile. Young. In need of his guidance..... who was she? He could remember her, yet at the same time......

His memories, as hard as he thought. He couldn't remember them. They didn't help Cassandra to wake up.

No matter how the carbuncle called, yelled, or tugged at the trainee there was no reaction. Ryan wasn't waking up and every memory he tried to form and show the trainee just crumbled and faded away. Too weak to have any affect. The two of them just hadn't known each other long enough to form a proper bond. Hell, they were still getting to know each other!

"Damn you, Ryan!" Locke hissed out through gritted teeth, as if the trainee had purposely defied him and maybe he had. Perhaps his memories were too desirable to leave for the unfavorable present? Perhaps, perhaps not. Either way, even with the slight chance of their being some truth to that, as small as it was, it had the carbuncle pissed.

Rolling up his sleeves, Locke turned Ryan's head upwards; cupping the trainee's face with both hands.

Well, even if this was a trick and he wasn't really free, his body seemed real enough. So perhaps trying a little something would have more success?

"You better not make me regret this..!" He warned, bringing his face closer to Ryan's. If this didn't work, he would hold Ryan personally responsible!

Taking in a breath, the carbuncle leaned in closer and then, with as much force as he could gather, smacked his forehead against Ryan's. Oh how he had been longing to do that! Though, as much as he enjoyed doing just that, it wasn't just as a simple headbutt. The moment he struck the other trainee, he drove the very first memory into his mind with as much will power as he could gather. The very first memory they had.

"WAKE UP!"

Whether it was the memory, the headbutt, or the headache forming from the headbutt, Ryan's eyes flew open and immediately put his hand to his head.

Maybe it was the headbutt after all.

"Wha...? Locke?"

Otto's happy haze was fading away. The link with his weapon had been restored. However, both master and weapon felt.. horrible. Deep regret, and an ache that wouldn't go away. Tenya had given up a second chance, and Otto had been tempted with living in his happiest memory. And now, the figure stood, offering it once more.
No turning back. The exit was right there. He could stay, be free of the island and all it's burdens. He could stay in that bright and peaceful memory, one of the only times in his life he felt truly happy and calm. Forever. Tenya could live in her illusion of being alive. But that's all it would be. An illusion.

"Sorry, don't believe in fairy tales." Otto grouched, rushing past the figure and making his escape from this place.

<> Tenya joked, a bit sadly.