Chapter 2 - We Need to Talk

Everyone was excited about the hot chocolate Dez had made, and ran in once they heard the call for it. Kuro had been standing right next to the door after getting tired of Rasp continuously dumping snow down his shirt or pelting him with snowballs. Dez started to pass out the hot chocolate as people began walking through the door. Everyone who received the hot chocolate decided to stay inside, except for Dez. He stood on the porch, watching as the snow came down as a light powder and rested on the heavily trampled layer of snow. A slight worried expression crossed his face, there were two more cups of hot chocolate that had yet to be handed out. Two people hadn’t come in yet, and they were nowhere in sight, and meanwhile, on the far side of the meadow where the open field breaks into a vast forest of snow heavy trees, a game still continues.
Rasp fled behind one of the trees as a snowball just barely missed him. Jex was finally getting a hang of the game and started to loosen up a little after Rasp had chased him out of to sight of the others. The two of them had been firing back and forth for a while completely oblivious to the missing sounds of their friends laughter. They finally took note of this when they stopped to catch their breath. Rasp began clinching at his chest, as did Jex. The cold air felt rough on their lungs after there game.
Rasp smiled at Jex, “Good game-” he broke and panted- “I didn’t expect you to have such good aim.”
Jex returned with a nod and a ragged ‘thank you.’
“I guess we better head in before our friends start worrying about us,” Jex said after getting his breath back.
“Sounds like a good idea to me,” Rasp said back, “we better hurry though, I wouldn’t want to be out here once dark sets over.”
“Hm? Afraid of the dark?” Jex asked.
“Far from it, but do you know how far we’ve wandered, strange things happen here under the shroud of darkness.”
Jex could only give a quizzing look. The sun was making it’s last glimmers in the night sky, turning the snow white clouds in the sky a marvelous menagerie of colors. Different shades and hues of red, pink, purple, orange, and even a bit of gold outlined every cloud near the sunset.
Rasp soon found himself lost in his thoughts, and old memories playing back to him like a broken record as he stared down the sunset. Images began dancing in his mind. He felt a strong tug at his heart. All the colors began to melt away into black and white in his head in a dizzying array that caused him to fall to his knees.
Jex looked at him with shock. “Rasp? Hey! What are you doing?”
Jex waved a hand in front of Rasp’s face. It was the same unresponsive expression the Arac had. An old memory was back to haunt Rasp as well.
Jex was very uncertain about what had just happened. He hadn’t known Rasp well, or long but he could tell something was definitely wrong.
Rasp said nothing, but just continued to stare at the colors painted on the clouds by the sunset. In his own mind a slideshow of odd memories, like pictures, flipped through his head as a melodious tune whistled out on a soft wooden flute.
Jex, thinking quickly, found a way to awaken him from the trance.
Rasp was suddenly brought out of his slideshow of old memories as he felt and icy glob of slush hit the top of his head. Shocked by the sudden contact he fell face first into the snow.
“HEY!” He said turning to Jex who had a hold on a tree branch covered with snow that he had shaken to wake up Rasp, “what was that for?”
Jex couldn’t quite explain what happened, so instead he just pointed out how the last sliver of sun had just disappeared over the horizon leaving their path under a shroud of darkness. Rasp stood up, shocked.
“oh… crap…” were the only audibly words Rasp mumbled.
Jex looked in the general direction of the house, “we need to hurry back, they’re all probably very worried…”
Rasp only nodded as they made their way back to the house. The moon was covered by the clouds that had given them the snow, leaving them in complete darkness as the wandered across the meadow, sticking close together so that they wouldn’t get even more lost than they already were. Finally they spotted something. A light flickered in the distance through the curtained windows of a house with figures inside shuffling about.
“It’s the house!” Rasp shouted, too excited to contain himself. He darted towards the house dragging Jex by his wrist across the snowy field and finally stopping of the porch where a very worried Dez was happy to see them.
“I was so worried about you two! What happened? Where did you go? I called everybody in for hot chocolate but you two were nowhere to be seen!” Dez said as they stepped onto the porch. “I’m so glad to see you’re ok.”
He gave Jex a light hug and then took them both inside. Rasp wandered around the house for a bit while Dez tried to get the story out of Jex who didn’t seem to feel like talking. He finally found what he was looking for. Elet, Skof, Kuro, Wayra, and Arac all sat around a circular table playing some sort of card game. As Elet dealt the next hand Rasp walked up behind Arac and firmly put his hands down on each of his shoulders. He lifted Arac out of his seat and forced him to come with him.
“Wah!!! Hey!!” the exasperated Arac complained as Rasp drug him away.
He walked into a spare room and closed the door once Arac entered. Arac finally caught onto what happened, Rasp was starting to have his visions as well. He looked at the short figure standing before him with a serious face.

It was one of the few things in common that they had. They don’t seem to remember the first half of their lives, as if they just materialized out of thin air. They don’t remember their family or their lives before, they can’t even remember their own age or birthday, all of those memories were lost. Every winter though, once the snow starts falling they see pictures in their heads. Never enough to tell a story, but just enough to get you interested. They play through their head in a slideshow of black and white to the odd music of an old wooden flute.

“We need to talk…” Rasp said.

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