Title: Wistful Remembrance
Author: Rapis-Razuri
Beta: N/A
Word Count: 771
Game: duodecim
Characters/Pairings: Tidus/Yuna
Notes: I got the idea for this short from a doujinshi I found on pixiv. Since I can't read Japanese, I mostly inferred what happened based on the art.

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"Hah...listen to me. This lost memories thing must be driving me crazy."

Because really, why else would he be talking to a manikin?

She...well, the person whose appearances and abilities it mimicked was a she, simply stared back at him with a blank expression as she... it – whatever – sat against a rock formation. He fought against it earlier. It didn't fight him, not directly, but summoned creatures to fight in its steed. Cecil told him they were imitations of things his world called eidolons, but Tidus wasn't so sure. Eidolons, eidolons, eidolons...no matter how many times he repeated the word to himself or how he said it, the term doesn't click with him.

"...but anyway..."

Short haired and petite, the crystal from which it was made made it hard to pin down anything specific of its original's features. Regardless, the girl on whom this manikin was based on must have been beautiful, he was sure, but how would he even know that in the first place?

"...I know you don't I?"

She did not give him a reply. He was enough of a fool to hope for one.

"...Cecil once talked about how one of the blue manikins a lot looked like a friend of his..."

But manikins took the form of the warriors summoned by the gods. Some of the Chaos warriors he and the others encountered dropped hints that this wasn't the first cycle in the conflict of the gods and Kain Highwind was nowhere to be seen.

"...You...you were here once, weren't you?"

As soon as he spoke those words, he knew it was the truth. He knew her. She was a warrior from a previous cycle, there was no other explanation to why this manikin looked like her.

...but what exactly happened to her? Tidus couldn't help but feel as though he failed in some way. Failed to protect her? Was it his fault she was no longer with them?

...Or was that not the case at all?

"It's strange..." he continued the monologue. Sweet Cosmos, what if somebody walked in on him now? "But I sometimes get this feeling that there's someone driving me forward...Not in the same way my old man drives me... It's in a more...gentle kind of way..."

Oh no... His voice was cracking and his eyes were getting misty. Good thing nobody was here to see him like this. He could almost hear his father teasing him, the voice in his head was too irritatingly similar to the real thing. Crybaby.

Cold crystalline fingers gently touched his cheek. Tidus raised his head in astonishment. The manikin was looking him and she was smiling tenderly as though she was trying to tell him not to cry without words.

Manikins were ruthless monsters that brought nothing but death and destruction. They didn't feel, so why did this one just smile in a way that made his chest tighten and his throat dry?

Slowly, hesitantly, Tidus reached out and touched the manikin's cheek. His gloved hand and her face were in contact for barely a few seconds when she finally crumbled into a pile of orange crystal.

He stayed exactly where he was until he heard Firion calling his name. Quickly wiping his eyes, he picked up the sword that had clattered to the ground at his side. Putting a smile on his face, he turned to face his friend.

"Hey Firion! Any luck with finding your crystal?"

"Heh, no, not yet."

Find their crystals, storm Chaos' lair, take him down, and go home. It was simple enough, really. At least for those who remembered their homes. Tidus remembered almost nothing. He knew his father, that they shared a career of being a professional blitzball player at some point, and he picked up his unique brand of swordsmanship from...somewhere.

His gaze found the broken crystal fragments again. But where did she fit in all this?

"Tidus? Hey, Tidus..."

Firion's voice snapped him out of his daze. "...Huh?"

"Are you okay? You seemed kinda distracted."

"What? Of course! Why wouldn't I be?" Laughing it off, Tidus broke into a sprint. "Come on, let's go! Those crystals won't find themselves you know!"

"H-hey! Tidus, wait!"

Find his crystal, show his dad how much he's grown, and somewhere down the line, maybe he reclaim his memories of her.

With that thought in mind, he entered the next gateway with Firion at his heels. Yes, he'll fight. This conflict can't go on forever. When it ends, he'll find a way back to her – the real her. He wasn't how, but he will.

He defiantly will.

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A/N: Hope you liked?