AScension

Chapter 1

To my diary, although it makes me wonder if anyone has ever really been named “Diary.”  I’m writing this because a very nice Vulpi psychologist, a Doctor Emmeniama de Kestrick, suggested I should do it.  If I’m talking to this Diary individual, I suppose it would be rude to not introduce myself.  Hello, my name is Akashar.  Yep, that’s it.  Just Akashar.  I don’t have a last name, not even a fake one.  I thought about making one up, but every time I tried to after the accident, it just didn’t seem right.  Since you are just named Diary, then I’m thinking this may be okay with you.  At least, we’re not alone.  I know of a few others in Shanandrae who are the same way.

You see, Diary, I’m hoping you can understand me because I really have a hard time understanding myself.  You see, I don’t have all of my memories.  In fact, I don’t even know how old I am.  All I know is that about sixteen seasons ago, I was found outside of the hospital grounds of Shanandrae Commons hospital.  I wasn’t in very good shape.  I had a really high fever and stomach problems, well not true, they were intestine problems … ones bad enough to kill me.  They nearly did.  Doctors told me that they had to work really hard to save me.  I’m grateful, Diary, but there’s a part of me that almost wishes they would have let me die all the way.  No, you see, I look at that sol as the one where a part of me did die.  That’s the part of me that remembers who I really am, remembers my name and my past and everything else about me.  That’s what died, and I, sadly, am all that’s left.

I don’t suppose everything about that old life died.  I could read and write, some, but not really well … or good?  I can never remember.  Yeah, and it’s true, I can never remember.  The skills are there like the talking and the reading and the writing and walking and all sorts of other stuff, but I can’t for the life of me get back the memory of when I learned those things.  Some Thurians who lose their memories have flashes of their past.  I don’t have a thing, not even in dreams.  I might have been rich.  I might have been important.  Now, I’m poor and a nobody.  I’m so poor, I tell others, that I don’t even have memories.  Well, I’m not like really destitute or anything.  I have a job and earn enough to feed myself, although I am still paying on my medical bills.  Everything anyone sees or knows of me, as far as I can tell, began about sixteen seasons ago.

This, Diary, is the point where most Thurians start to get that look in their eyes.  When I get to this part of the story, they doubt I’m telling them the truth.  They think I’m hiding something, something horrible I did.  Whenever I talk to someone with a connection to enforcement, I generally see them scribbling down notes.  They’ve tried to find out who I am for seasons and seasons.  See, what will happen is that I will tell them those things I said just now, and they’ll go off and check.  Several sols later, I’ll get a visit from them, and then they have the second look in their eyes – pity.  I don’t know which look is worse, honestly.  If they haven’t gone off the cliff thinking I am actually part of some giant government conspiracy, they will finally believe me, and the dreadful part of my existence is there for all of them to see.

No, it’s not just not knowing who I am.  It’s not knowing what I’ve done that really scares me.  When I was found, no one came looking for me.  Why?  Had I done something horrible and that’s why I wasn’t worth someone’s time?  Maybe, I was just this hopeless charity case – the Thurian you can’t get off of your sofa.  What if my memories are gone because I saw something horrible or did something horrible that is just too bad to remember?  What if I am hiding something and even I don’t know it?  Worse, was there someone out there who needed me, and I wasn’t there.  I’m not there.  Damn.  I’m almost convinced I’d be happier to have lost my own tail rather than to not have any memories because now I don’t know if there is someone out there I murdered or rapemated or abandoned or hurt in countless other ways.  It’s really hard for me to not know that, and it drags me down.

And it’s not just me who doesn’t understand how my past can be a mystery.  Everyone from birth, except me, is genetically recorded in the master naming index.  Those indexes are backed up and copied and all sorts of other stuff to make sure nothing gets lost.  I’m not in there.  I’m not.  I’ve heard theories from others for seasons about what that means, and I’m not happy with them.  I could have been taken from my mother at birth, raised and then forced to be someone’s possession or pet.  That genetic thing would have the ability to track down close relatives.  Yeah, they aren’t in there, either.  So, was like my whole family taken at birth and raised by themselves?  Doesn’t seem likely.  There are stories of Thurians who get their records erased from the genetic indexes, but that usually only happens with the help of someone very rich and very powerful.  Again, why bother?  I’m not worth anything to anyone.

Now, I’m sorry, Diary, for complaining so much and making it sound worse than it really is.  See, I was rescued, nursed back to health, and then found the Creator’s Path and a bunch of really helpful Thurians who took care of me and helped me get a new start.  Trade school was paid for as I worked as a janitor at the chapel, and now I’m a mechanical technician over at FridgeTech; we do geo-cooling for lairs and offices.  Hey, I say that a lot, it seems.  Well, it is true.  It’s a good job, and I get to help out.  Our chapel is small, and I still help them clean up, and I make enough at FridgeTech to take care of myself.  It’s not a bad life; I just wish it had more history to it.

Well, I don’t want to bore you, Diary, with the tales of my confused and messed up life, but I appreciate you listening.  You’re very nonjudgmental, and I like that about you.  Speaking of like, I’ll say just one more thing.  Over the past moon, I’ve noticed a brown and gold Faelnar kind of keeping an eye on me.  I think she works in the hospital, too, where Doctor Emma is, and when I’ve asked about her, she seems pretty popular with the nurses and doctors.  I’m not totally sure what she does, but she gets called in when things get really bad with a patient, or so I hear.  Lots of bad in these sols – Sahnassites and Vanarrans going after each other, mostly, but a lot of folks like me just plain lost.  I’m lost in not knowing who I really am, but I believe the Creator knows, and I believe and have faith.

She spoke to me, this Faelnar.  She said I reminded her of someone she lost long ago.  It was someone close to her, I think.  She said his name was Ash.  Funny name, but I suppose I can’t talk.  I picked Akashar as a name because I heard on a VidStar program someone talking about ancient Nephti settlements.  If nomads came across land that had an abandoned village or farm or something like that – temple maybe, they’d call it akashar.  The word was meant to describe a lost land, one that was used for some purpose but now no one knows for what.  Ash, though.  At least Ash might have the ashes of his past.  I don’t even have that.

I figured that she’d just kind of ignore me after that, seeing as I’m not who she thinks I am, but she hasn’t done that.  I seem to run into her from time to time, and she’s very nice to me.  I won’t lie to you, Diary, she’s attractive.  I’m not sorry to see her as far as her looks go.  As far as what’s on the inside, she’s a little guarded.  She has a close friend, a sister maybe, who works with her at the hospital, and she’s also very kind to me.  I don’t see her as much, only when I go to visit Doctor Emma.  I get the sense that this Faelnar – her name is Vanalla, by the way – wants to know more about me, but I try to keep it light, on the surface.  After all, there isn’t much below the surface, at least that I can tell.  Thurians deserve more in a mate than a half of someone.  As old as I am with as many memories as I have missing, I’m not even that.

Oh, wow.  I just read all of this, and I’m writing in circles.  Doctor Emma is right.  I need to do something to figure this out, come to peace with it at least.  She prodded me, last time, to read Vanarra de Gonari’s biography from the last chapter to the first, and so I think I’m going to try doing that.  I might try to set up visits through work, but again, I’m not sure I want to.  No!  I’m doing it again and in the same paragraph!  Okay, I’m going to try.  I’m going to try to get real help.

Thank you, Diary, for listening.  It means a lot to me.  I think it helped.  Maybe when I sort myself out, I can help you.  It would only be fair.  I’ll talk to you later.  Thank you again.