The Trouble with Time, Part 10 - Pier

"Thought I'd find you here."

Sam steps through the door, the linoleum tiles of the Corridor changing into wet sand. At the end of the long pier Kevin doesn't look back, just keeps staring up at the sky, the countless stars twinkling in the deep dark. He sits with his legs dangling over the edge, just slightly above the waves.

"You said you wanted to talk," Sam continues, as they start to walk down the pier towards him. "And then the shop sign said closed and you weren't on the showroom floor. What on Earth is going on?"

"I don't know what to do," he says, though he still doesn't look down.

"This is about your Acquirer again, isn't it?" they say. They pull off their boots, before plopping down to sit next to him.

"She needs First Love," he says. "I don't have any."

"I'm sorry, but I don't either..."

"No, I figured. It's hard to acquire, I know." He pauses then, looks down at his hands. "But there was a customer in today, said he has two bottles."

"Two? That is impressive. Who is it?"

"A Frenchman by the name of Jean-Claude Leroy. I've not met him before, apparently he frequents Misha's store."

Sam hums, runs a finger along their lips. "Name sounds familiar," they say, "but I don't think I've met him personally." A heartbeat passes between the two. "What could he possibly need that Misha doesn't have? No offense, but your inventory is smaller."

"He needs a Golden Fruit."

They blink, jaw slightly ajar. He's turned his gaze back to the sky.

"Oh," the syllable drops from their mouth, hangs in the air. The waves continue to lap at the beach behind them. "And nobody else--"

"I called around," he answers, not even needing to hear the question. "Nobody currently has First Love in their inventory. Not Misha, not Raja, not even Laleh, nobody. And with her deadline in a few weeks Leroy is our only chance."

"I--" They stop to think, worrying their lip between their teeth, before finally sighing. "It does seem that way."

"She already says she'll do it, after I explained what the Golden Garden does to a human," he sighs. "Selfless to a fault that one. But I was wondering if you knew of any ways to slow down the effects, or anything?"

They stare at him for a moment, frowning. "This is very out of character for you," they say.

"What?" he says, and finally looks directly at Sam. Their mouth is drawn in a thin line, their eyes serious.

"I've known you for nearly 20 years now," they start as he stares. "And I've never seen you so personally invested in anything. Why her?"

He sighs, deeply. "I just... I have a feeling," he says, and is rewarded a pointed look and a raised eyebrow. "Okay, here's the thing. She's started working for me almost 9 years ago, but something happened during the last few year. I didn't see her nearly as much as before, and for the entirety of last year she just completely disappeared. Then soon after last New Year's she just wanders into the store. Total amnesia. She can't recall basically anything, and only from the past three years, including her new name. All she has is a note, hastily scribbled, with a spell on it. Since then we've been working to first decipher the spell and then gather up the ingredients. The note also set a time limit of a year, which is why we're running out of time."

"What is her name, anyway?" Sam asks then. Kevin opens his mouth but finds that nothing comes out.

"I... don't know," he says as the realisation sets in. "I know she changed it two years ago, but... I have no idea what it is."

"Huh," they say. "What about the spell? What's it do?"

"No idea, the note didn't say," he says, though his mind is now reeling. How does he not know her name? He knows her deadname, but not her real one? Why? How? What else does he not know of her? He is majorly freaking out, but only on the inside. "I didn't recognise it either, but we gathered it would help her figure out what happened to her. Most of the ingredients are very personal."

"Well, either way, I don't think I can really do anything," they says after a while, as they stand up and dust off the back of their trousers. "I don't know much about the Garden or the kind of magic it produces, so I can't exactly make any kind of antidote or anything." They chuckle. "Not unless you want me to preemptively erase your memories."

Kevin looks up. Sam pales.

"Kevin, no," they say, horrified.

~x~

"I'm sorry, you want to do what exactly?"

"We're gonna take all your memories, and put them into a box," Kevin says with a huge grin. She glances between him and Sam, who looks very tired. "And then when you go into the Garden, you'll have no memories to lose! It's brilliant, I don't know why nobody's thought of it before!"

"Because it's not brilliant, it's stupid and risky!" Sam says. "It includes tearing your memories from your mind, memories that are intricately linked to your personality and storing them in a box. And then, and then once you return you have to put those memories back and hope that if your mind doesn't implode, you're still the same fucking person!"

"I have full faith in your capabilities to perform this surgery," he tells them cheerily. They groan and throw their hands in the air.

"Have you done something like this before?" she asks and they turn to look at her.

"I have," they say, only slightly hesitant. "A few times. It doesn't always go without a hitch, and you will almost definitely be a changed person afterwards."

"I'll be a changed person either way," she says. She looks down, plays with the red ribbon tied around her wrist. Then she looks back up. "Do it," she says. "That way, at least, I'll have a chance to retain myself."

"Alright," they sigh. "But I will not take responsibility for the potential downfall."

"I understand," she says. "Let me write down instructions for myself, and then you can start."

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This... took so much longer than I wanted it to and I didn't even want to end there, I wanted to write a bit more, Kevin was gonna go with her but hhhhhhhh it's late and I need to go to bed.

Next topic is Caterpillar, bye now~

Pie out.