She awoke in a cold sweat, shaking her head and trying to focus, remember where she was, who she was. She hated her nightmares, especially from before the... Incident. She looks around, and sees a shelf of malformed attempts to make... Something. On her desk rests her latest attempt that she's still working on, and next to it rests a small jar, more so a vial, with a small red jewel seemingly floating inside. It's attached to a string to make some sort of amateur necklace, and upon seeing it, her mind calmed down and she slowly regained her composure.
She wondered.... She wondered if what she was doing was right. If it would even be the same if she did. But as she thought, she realized it was pointless to try and calculate it. It's a game of chance, and she's repeatedly rolling the dice just to be able to place her bet, and so far she's failed every time. She doesn't give up, but now is swinging her legs off the bed and pulling herself to stand, wobbling slightly on her legs. She frowns, knowing why she's so weak. She's becoming frail so quickly, only 22 and already falling apart.
She moves to get to the desk, sitting down as she pulls out wood sculpting tools, and paused to look fondly at the Band-Aids that cover her fingers due to all the splinters. She grabs a hair tie and slowly ponytails her long white hair, and accents it by tying a red ribbon over the tie. She then sets to work, carefully carving away and and shaping the wood, trying to smooth a curve on what can be assumed to be part of a mouth off a nutcracker, if the inside wasn't hollow.
She works, focused only on the project. At least until one of her friends shows up with breakfast, letting themselves in and heading straight to her with donuts and coffee.
"Hey,"
they spoke,
"you're still working on that?"
She looks to them, and lightly nods. She grabs one of the two small boxes and one of the coffees, setting them aside. Their friend sat on the bed.
"You know that all this could be pointless, right? That you may have wasted 8 years on this, and that you honestly can't reverse what that thing did?"
She sits in silence, before finally speaking.
"It's better to try than to never know if I could. I wouldn't be here right now if... You know. I don't need to tell you. Thank you for bringing breakfast though, I had forgotten dinner last night."
She opens the box and selects a donut at random, and starts munchies as she pulls over a sketchbook and pencil. She flips through, finding a blank page and sketching out a basic shape, lifting the dimensions it would need to be to fit with the piece she just completed. She sighs once done with that, and then looked at the window.
"But..."
She looks back to the project, a dedicated sorrow in her eyes.
"If it doesn't work..."
She closes her eyes, covering her face with her hands, a sense of dread to her words.
"I'm afraid of what I might do next."
YOU ARE READING
The Years Gone By
FanficYears have passed since a particular incident nearly erased a child's closest friend and ally. She has worked relentlessly to try and bring him back.
