37: Imperfect Recall, part II
The warehouse in question was the very same a leansídhe had once nested in, and where Kaori and Shelley had been ensnared and driven to attempted suicide. Katrina had been there when Phantasia fought the shadow-demon, but chances were she wouldn’t remember that, and Wotan had confiscated the auragraphic evidence. Perhaps this would jog her memory?
“You’ve been getting friendly with Dante lately,” she said as they walked towards their destination, “He told me there was nothing going on between you two. He’s totally not the relationship type anyway.”
“I’m just trying to get to know him,” said Phantasia, “He’s a strange boy. He has an odd aura.”
Katrina looked at her with a grin. “You know he refuses to let me take an auragraph of him? If he wasn’t like my brother I’d be tempted to do it in secret but that’d be kinda wrong of me. He’s locked himself in room again too. You better not have traumatised him!”
“He should be fine,” Phantasia lied. She could sense unease in Katrina’s aura, like suspicion gnawing away at their personal bond. Maybe it was best not to tease it.
“I know what you mean about his aura though,” she continued, “There’s something about him that worries me.”
Back when they’d been in the Godhand manor and found Dante recovering from some form of terrifying mental anguish, Katrina had recognised it and, with his permission, had explained it to her. Allegedly Dante broke down in stressful situations and those around him were prone to either fleeing the scene in terror or fainting. Phantasia wondered if that was what happened at the World’s End when Dante saw the mural of Erebus. As much as she’d like to ask Katrina for details, though, she would have no memory of talking about them previously, nor of Dante giving her permission to or even of Phantasia’s identity being revealed. How troublesome. If only she remembered…
“I feel like he’s hiding things from me,” said Phantasia, at a loss for what else she could say.
“Oh, everyone says that about Dante. Well anyone who doesn’t just label him a psychopath because he can get stressed out if you push the wrong buttons,”
Phantasia couldn’t let this opportunity drop and took a risk. “I’ve heard about an incident at a nightclub…”
Katrina stopped and her grip on her plush toy tightened, but her face betrayed none of the bubbling negativity Phantasia could feel swelling up inside her. “That’s been blown out of proportion,” she said, “Joel shouldn’t have taken Dante to such a horrible place. It’s filled with drugs and all sorts! And all those people! It’s no wonder Dante had a breakdown, but he’s totally not a psychopath or a schizophrenic!”
Judging from Katrina’s increasing irritability, Phantasia decided not to push the topic any further. They arrived at the wrecked warehouse in silence and began to pick their way through the rubble. Time to try another theory.
“This kinda reminds me of something,” she said, “Like I’ve been here before in a dream,”
The miasma surrounding Katrina’s aura was blown away. “Oh! Oh! You have that too!” she said, jumping up and down on the spot, “I keep having these feelings about stuff! I daren’t tell anyone in case they start accusing me of being paranoid or something, but if you’re having them too then it can’t just be me!”
Why couldn’t these people just share their thoughts rather than be paranoid about everything? Phantasia would have to force everything out into the open at this rate!
