Simma was falling... falling through terrains of flashing lights, streaks of memories whizzing past him like fireflies gone mad. He whooped past moments of his own past and echoes of others, tumbling downward as though he and gravity had gotten into a quarrel and gravity was determined to win.

His hair was plastered backward, his face scrunched tight, cheeks puffing like dough in an oven.

The place around him was white. White... so very white it felt as if he had been dropped into the belly of a cloud. But the whiteness was constantly stained, stabbed through by bursts of memory, blurred yet vivid, each one zooming past at a fascinating speed.

And then...

thump.

He hit the ground.

The landing came so abruptly, so mercilessly, that his knees almost buckled. His feet throbbed, his legs pulsed under the sudden weight of his own body, and Simma staggered like someone waking from a dream mid-fall.

Beside him stood Zolomon. They were no longer holding hands, no longer wrapped in a blazing ball of energy, and most definitely no longer standing in Zolomon's chamber.

No. They were now in the middle of a street.

The honking, rushing roar of cars above them confirmed it; this wasn't illusion. This was real. But one thing was certain, they were inside Zolomon's memory.

The weather was lovely, the kind of golden sunlight that made you want to whistle even if you couldn't. The streets bustled with people going about their daily business: traders barking their goods, children darting like arrows, the chatter of buyers and sellers weaving together into a messy but oddly comforting song.

The houses here were large, grand even, though scattered among them were smaller homes, like pebbles among boulders, all neatly aligned with alleys running like veins between them.

Zolomon lifted his hand and pointed at one particular building: a wooden, almost ancient-looking house that seemed embarrassingly out of place in this well-kept neighborhood. Its beams sagged, its wood looked tired, yet it stood stubbornly, like an old soldier who refused to retire.

And there, right opposite where they stood, was another Zolomon. His past self, walking with that unmistakable calm.

Simma understood immediately. He nodded without question, then, the both moved to follow the memory.

"Where are we?" Simma asked, wide eyes sweeping the scene, the busy roads, the horses pulling carriages, bikes weaving dangerously close to pedestrians, sellers hollering at buyers who pretended not to hear, and an endless stream of feet pattering across stone.

Zolomon, adjusting his white robe which was girded neatly at the waist with a ribbon that shimmered faintly, replied, "We are inside town." He paused in front of the wooden house... No, a tavern, though it looked more like it had crawled out of a history book, and gestured toward it. "Specifically, in front of this."

The tavern didn't match its surroundings. Here, the houses were sophisticated, polished with wealth and standing tall in quiet pride. The tavern was… not.

"This is nowhere near the citadel," Zolomon added with a faint smile.

Simma tilted his head. From inside the tavern came a racket, not the drunken laughter of men too far gone in ale, not the soft moans of women from its rented rooms, but thick, violent sounds. Chairs breaking. Wood cracking. And the unmistakable thud of flesh against wood.

"What do you think is going on in there?" Simma asked as they followed memory-Zolomon to the door.

The present Zolomon's voice dropped, heavy as stone.

"Nothing I would like to speak of." He was saying the truth for he had lived that memory already.

They stepped through the door behind his memory self.

The tavern was chaos. Chairs splintered, bodies slammed, fists flew like hailstones in a storm. Yet no one seemed distressed. The rest of the patrons just sat drinking as though this was dinner entertainment.

Simma had barely stepped forward when...

Whizz!

A goblet flew at his face. He winced, bracing for the sting, only for the cup to sail right through him.

Zolomon, barely blinking, murmured, "Do not worry. They cannot see, hear, touch, or hurt us."

Simma exhaled, cheeks puffing in relief. He turned his eyes back to the chaos. Six men already lay sprawled across the floor like logs cut too short for the fire. At the center of it all, one man stood tall, dark, and broad-shouldered, a storm of violence wrapped in flesh.

And Simma's heart skipped.

"Zaro?!" he gasped.

It was indeed Zaro. The man looked like trouble personified, his fists moving faster than logic, his eyes burning with that same reckless defiance Simma remembered. He wasn't fighting, he was dismantling his enemies.

One poor soul lunged at him, but with one hand, he caught the man by the head, his screams echoing like a bad song, as a green energy crackled around it, it was a power able to make the man's head phase through solid matter like it was air.

Another attacked. Zaro, with insulting ease dodged the man's punch with a sharp backward lean, then in the same smooth motion, grabbed the attacker's wrist with his free hand and snapped it like a twig.

The man howled. Zaro then spun him around and shoved the phased head of the first man directly into the second man's backside.

Yes.

He shoved it straight into the poor fellow's buttocks.

The tavern fell silent for one breath. Then...

"ARGGGGGHHHHH!"

The scream rattled the rafters. Patrons sipped their ale with grins of cruel amusement.

Simma clamped a hand over his mouth, somewhere between horror and laughter. 'Had Zaro just…? Oh yes, he definitely had.'

With one final, merciless punch, Zaro sent the man flying into unconsciousness. They both lay flat on the ground, with the first man head still inside the seconds man ass, looking like a centaur, only that it was not half human half human half horse but half human and still yet half human.

It was then that the memory-Zolomon stepped forward, walking toward the battered bar counter as though tavern-wide bar fights were merely mild inconveniences.

"Zaro," he called evenly.

From behind the shattered bar, a woman emerged, dusting herself off. She had clearly been hiding.

Zaro turned, his face still flushed with fury. "What... you come to fight me too?" He queried without looking at Zolomon, instead glancing at the woman. "Another glass of wine, please."

Zolomon ignored the barb, A smirk tugged at his lips.

"You never change, do you?"

But Zaro wasn't in the mood for jokes. He downed his drink, muttering, "Peasants don't like seeing a Lotus. Fine... I've tripled their hatred. But I've also tripled their fear.... Respect and fear, old man. That's balance."

Zolomon's eyes swept the broken furniture, the unconscious bodies, the patrons still watching with half-hidden smirks.

"That," he said smoothly, "looked like no reason at all to use your powers to phase someone's head into another man's ass."

Simma snorted. He couldn't help it. 'Head into an ass. Truly, the world never runs out of surprises.'

Zaro drained his goblet. "What do you want, old man Zolomon? You didn't come here to nag me about tavern manners."

Zolomon chuckled. "Well, we both know you're older... far older. But yes, I need your help."

Zaro's brow arched. "Help? From me? Oh, this I've got to hear."

"I want you to train someone," Zolomon said, voice calm as still water.

Zaro nearly spat his drink. "I already trained you... forty-five years ago, while you were still learning how to tie your robe. Why should I do it again?"

Zolomon shrugged. He wasn't wrong.... when he had struggled to tame his Azrax, it was Zaro he had turned to. Zaro had been eighty then, yet looked no older than twenty. The gift.. and curse... of being a Lotus.

"You'll want to," Zolomon answered softly. "Because if I'm right… the one I need you to train already has a bond with you."

Zaro froze, eyes narrowing. The humour drained away as realization dawned. He knew of the bond Zolomon was speaking about, but the way Zolomon had sounded made him know something was off, and therefore he asked in a way that no one else would know.

"…He doesn't know?" The he, he was referring to was Zelihuth. Because when this memory had happened, Simma hadn't known himself then.

Zolomon shook his head.

"Are you sure?"

"I have doubts," Zolomon admitted. "But I think it is worth the risk."

Then he turned, walking away.

Simma's head spun. Questions clawed at him, biting for answers.

As the memory-Zolomon passed them, Simma froze. The past memory suddenly stopped, frowned, and turned towards them, his gaze sharpening, as though he sensed them there.

Simma panicked, as he whispered to the real Zolomon through the edge of his mouth, "I thought he wasn't meant to see us!"

Zolomon calmly tapped his arm, urging silence.

The memory-Zolomon started toward them, eyes scanning like blades, until Zaro's voice cut across the tension.

"Hey, old man. That's not the door."

The room laughed nervously. Memory-Zolomon blinked, shaken free of his suspicion, and turned toward Zaro.

"Old man?" he scoffed.

"You're almost a century older than me," Zolomon muttered.

"Ha! Then let's ask a girl who she'd rather fuck between me and you," Zaro shot back with a wicked grin.

Zolomon sighed. "They'd choose you."

"Exactly. Because I look younger than you. Old timer."

Zolomon walked away without answering.

Simma let out a breath he hadn't realized he was holding. "How did he know we were here?"

"Perceptive," Zolomon said simply. "Even then, I always felt watched. Turns out… I was right."

Simma nodded slowly, but his mind still boiled.

"What was the aim of showing me this?" he demanded.

Zolomon's voice dropped, soft and deliberate.

"To show you that everything I've ever done was to protect you. Recruiting your old friend was not..."

"Wait," Simma cut in sharply, his brow arched. "My old friend? You knew? You've always known ?"

Zolomon hesitated, then admitted, "Not then. Then, I only suspected. But now…" He exhaled, heavy with truth. "Now, I am certain. It was only today, when you walked into my chambers, that I became sure."

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