Starting Life From Zero: Far From Home

Chapter Twelve

The sun was setting over the tops of the trees painting the sky a brilliant, warm orange that blended into the clouds with streaks of purple and dark blues mixed into it. Peter had taken his books out to the front steps to read, though he had moved on from the I-glyphs now. It was rough going and he had to stop and look things over all of the time, but at the very least he was getting somewhere.

It was a big help that the words as they spoke them were exactly the same as the people here. It was literally just a matter of getting the corresponding glyph to a letter pair. Language wasn't his strongest subject, but he wasn't bad at it by a long shot.

He felt foot steps behind him and smelled the subtle hint of the soap or perfume that Emilia used. This was something he had expected sooner, of course Emilia would wonder why he skipped dinner without saying anything to her. He knew that she would have just convinced him to come, seeing her eyes looking sad about the empty seat at the table was enough to convince him without words.

So he had told the maids and done his own thing. He wondered if maybe he didn't eat these dreams would pass. That was the only thing that had changed. The night he and Steve arrived there had been no dreams and they had eaten nothing.

"Peter," Emilia said. She bent down so that she was looking him in the face. Her long white hair dropped to the side hanging almost down to the steps. "I just came to make sure you weren't feeling sick."

Why did that shadowy woman in his dream sound just like Emilia. One thing was for certain, he would never hear Emilia say those same words.

"It's fine, I'm fine," he said. "I just want to get some studying in."

"Do you know how I know you're lying?" Asked Emilia. "Because I'm a terrible liar too."

Peter smiled and closed the book on his finger to hold is place. "Random question, do you have a twin sister or—or anything like that?"

Emilia stepped down to sit next to him. She shook her head. "I didn't know any of my family," she said. "Or I don't remember them."

"Oh?"

"My first memory is waking up in the forest and meeting Puck. I was frozen in the ice before that and..." Emilia trailed off.

"Whoa! That's like Captain Rogers. He went missing during World War II and everyone assumed he was dead. Then they found him frozen and he was still alive, like, seventy years later," Peter said.

Emilia put her finger to her lip. "Do you think I could have gone missing during some kind of war?"

Peter shrugged. "It's possible."

She shook her head as if trying to clear the memories out of it. "No, wait there was something I wanted to say to you after the other day."

"What is it?"

"I'm sorry for how I reacted when you pulled out that Metia," she said.

"I didn't really get why," Peter said. "But we all have our things."

Emilia sighed. "I have just, I'm not allowed to look at myself in the mirror or any kind of reflective surface."

"If that rule is pretty hard and fast then you're in luck because this isn't a mirror," Peter said pulling his phone out. "It's a camera, not even the kind that uses mirrors. It captures images and les you relive them. So it's not your reflection, it's like the you that you used to be." Peter snapped a photo of himself and held the phone up for her to see.

"Huh?"

"Is that me or is that the me from, like, five seconds ago?" Peter asked.

Emilia seemed confused. "The you from...back then?"