The next few weeks after Altair’s second birthday were spent acclimatising— to the corridors of his new reality, to his new self and to the unfamiliar world he found himself in. Organising his thoughts proved to be a far more challenging endeavour than he had expected, the reservoir of medical knowledge that he had regained proving to be significantly less permeable than one would hope, given that those memories belonged to him, after all.
The process of memory recollection, namely, the ability to recall was divided into six steps. In Altair’s case, the process of ‘encoding’ had never natively taken place within the domain of his brain. His mind had never truly acquired information from his environment and then processed it into a ‘snapshot’ that crystalized said memory— said experience— down to its essence.
The human mind did not possess the ability to record the minutiae of every moment, the vivid detail of every experience. Ironically enough, forgetting itself was the final step of the recall process— memories that were not retrieved regularly enough, ones that were not deemed important enough by the subconscious mind were allowed to fade away to make room for new insights and occurrences.
In his mind’s eye, his consciousness was represented by a radiant star that suffused the vast expanse of the realm with a brilliant light. Except there was a space that his light could not reach, the illumination of his rays engulfed by an all-pervasive darkness.
The Void’s form had revealed itself.
A black sun that dwarfed his star, easily exceeding its mass by a hundred times.
The nascent mind of a two year old could not support such an overwhelming deluge of information. Even among adults, not everyone was capable of keeping pace with the rigorous demands and intensive study required for certification as a doctor.
However, as Altair opened his eyes, he was sure of one thing— the restrictions of the Void were gone.
He no longer needed to interface with it, having regained Ryan Kimura’s sense of identity. Instead, he could directly syphon the information he needed from the black sun, as long as he remained cautious and did not overextend himself. With every session, the void shrunk by an almost imperceptible margin, whilst the star representing his consciousness grew ever so slightly brighter.
Altair focused on cultivating a basic understanding of the human body, focusing on information at the school level instead of jumping tiers and potentially inviting backlash from the void.
The importance of hygiene and sanitation, basic first aid protocols like the Heimlich manoeuvre and cardiopulmonary resuscitation or CPR as it was commonly known, identifying the early signs of common illnesses and basic remedies that could help treat them, even without access to medication.
Only after developing an understanding of what humans were normally capable of could he move onto the next step.
Altair had reached a far deeper understanding of the Eldrheman language or Old tongue as it roughly translated to, instead of merely being limited to a few basic words. Mother, upon being convinced that her son was a budding genius, had started to take a keen interest in his education.
Picture books, foundational alphabets, basic pronunciation, names of places, of people, of flora and fauna— Mother’s tutelage consisted of a well-rounded curriculum, albeit one that was a fair deal beyond your average toddler. After his second birthday, Altair had made sure to tone down his perceived genius; displaying enough of a reaction to keep Mother encouraged in her lessons, while interspersing his pronunciation attempts with childish mistakes and intentionally mixing up the names of flora with fauna among other intentional lapses in judgement.
Altair’s heart twinged with disappointment at the very thought of letting down mother’s expectations, but Ryan Kimura had seen enough of the world to know that the demarcation between a genius and a monster was a deceptively precipitous one. It was not hard to imagine the apparent implications and subtle nuances that one who possessed wisdom beyond his age carried, in a world where magic was held commonplace; even if it remained mere speculation on his part.
A compromise was struck.
Under the facade of willful ignorance, Altair continued to ravenously imbibe the knowledge Mother offered him, his mind a porous vessel that relentlessly absorbed every droplet of information accessible to him in pursuit of constructing a better understanding of his new home— the realm known as Alecdoria.
Naturally, his efforts did not cease there. Altair had a mission to fulfill; a vow that his past had made to the present.
When Mother was in her study parsing through scrolls, tomes and the occasional letter, Altair would enter the room calling for her attention. Through a few basic words, he would convey his desire to be with his Mother. Initially, his efforts were met with some resistance, as Mother tried to convince him to play with Nocturne, but Altair remained staunch in his demands.
Ultimately, Mother ended up relenting and he was allowed to sit in her lap whilst she was working— only because of how well-behaved he acted after his request was met. Watching Mother work gave Altair the perfect vantage point to deepen his linguistic base, even if he had no way of deciphering most of the words he encountered. Occasionally, she would point at a word and explain its meaning to him, mostly as a way to humour him and keep him entertained.
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Altair would respond with a cute laugh and clap his hands in delight, spurring a radiant smile to bloom upon his mother’s visage.
An idyllic month passed by as Altair dedicated his efforts towards grasping the basic rules of the Eldrheman language. The raw complexity of the language far surpassed English and some characters and phrases could have multiple interpretations and pronunciations, making the tongue quite inefficient in his eyes.
Though he was years away from mastering the language and many linguistic laws still remained a mystery to him, he had managed to learn enough for his purpose.
The first time he snuck out, Altair had waited for both Nocturne and Mother to fall into a deep sleep before he made his move. Lethargy was a daunting adversary for his infantile body, the thick cloud of sleepiness weighing down upon him dampening his senses as he slipped away from Nocturne’s side.
Altair did not know if the queen-sized bed he had been sleeping on was designed at a much lower height than Earth-norms out of consideration for the two infants or if Alecdoria’s cultural preferences preferred their place of rest closer to the ground, but it made his descent far more comfortable than he had hoped.
Come to think of it, he hadn’t seen or heard a single insect since he’d regained his memories— not the buzzing of a fly, the chirp of a cricket or the humming of wasps and bees. Part of the reason why beds were built as far away from the floor as possible was to keep, or atleast sell the illusion of being separated from what crawled below.
How curious.
Refocusing his thoughts, Altair had blinked away the sleepiness from his eyes and focused his efforts on muffling his footsteps as he left the bedroom and proceeded towards Mother’s study.
The first day, he managed to get to the quarter mark of a green-backed leather tome. The writing was characterised by elegant, if sometimes ostentatious flourishes, the individual letters packed together in dense clusters that flowed in unbroken calligraphy from one to the next. From the disjointed words he managed to pick up on, he had come to have the impression that the mention of colours, plants, fruits, beasts, of what he thought to be names of people and places, described a place. What place, he did not know. Where it might be situated, he had no idea.
But there was no mention of the commodity Altair sought.
No magic.
The second day came and the second day went by.
No magic.
Today was the third day.
Altair sat on Mother’s chair, two cushions propping him up so he could read at table height. His expression conveyed his focus as he flipped from one page to the next, his scouring gaze filled with determination. He had no time to waste. He had sworn an oath. Magic would be his. It had to be.
In his focus, Altair had forgotten that others could intrude upon his solitude.
Although he had forgotten, it was not something that he hadn’t foreseen.
If it was mother, he just had to pretend like a mischievous, curious child. Even if that required messing up the tome a little, it was still better than being seen as a monster. If it was Nocturne, he would just sheepishly laugh it off and escort his sister back to sleep. Because the only reason Nocturne would be in mother’s study was because she had noticed his absence.
Neither scenario worried him in the slightest.
And then his concentration was shattered entirely as the door stumbled open. His gaze shifted to the entrance, easing a little as he identified Nocturne. His serious expression was replaced with a boyish grin, a grin worn on his face without falsity or deceit. Altair loved his sister, after all.
So he playfully called her name out, as if he were extending an invitation to a game.
“Nocturne!”
There was silence for a few seconds as Nocturne remained rooted to the spot, without answering his call.
“Who are you?” came her reply, spoken out loud in a language that only Ryan Kimura was supposed to know in this world.
The blood in Altair’s veins turned cold.
The smile on his visage froze.
Time itself seemed to stop, as Nocturne’s words struck his heart with the ferocity of a released arrow.
The world around him was crumbling.
But Ryan Kimura was a surgeon.
His trade required extensive knowledge and training, a keen mind and an exacting level of precision.
It required attention to the minutest of details when examining a patient’s body, an attention to detail that naturally seeped into Ryan Kimura’s way of life itself.
The familiar inflection of Nocturne’s voice, the way she dragged over her S and R’s while quickly mumbling over her vowels.
The last words he had exchanged with Sophie, a memory that had been engulfed with too much pain and trauma to not have resurfaced until this very moment. ‘I met a lady. A very, very pretty lady…. Um, so the pretty lady had wings…. The lady told me that I would be healthy again…. I would have to go with her if I wanted to get better, though.’
The winged one that had thrown him off the hospital rooftop. ‘I shall accept that proposal…‘Golden… feathers? Wings?’
Altair’s tiny hands quaked in disbelief.
A solitary tear trickled down his cheeks.
It was not a curse that the winged one had cast upon him but rather… a wish.
Locking eyes with Nocturne, Altair’s lips trembled as he barely managed to get the words out.
“My name is Ryan.”