Author's Note: First draft, unedited. Herein lies spoilers for the series! (Also, I am so ashamed that everyone now knows how much my first drafts suck XD)

Static

A Word of the Day Ficlet

By Kysra

It begins, as all good stories do, with a girl who meets a boy and a boy who charms a girl. Of course, they are not really a boy or a girl but a man and a woman (even though he has a youthful personality and she has the looks of a first year high schooler); and she believes herself in love with another and he doesn't remember who he is.

Somehow, they come together and it's beautiful, interesting, and natural. He tells her that her smile is fantastic, and she wants nothing more than to linger a little longer, carelessly following him into the night.

He tells her upon introducing himself that he is a terrorist then an exchange student and then the truth - he doesn't know who he is; and it's strange and static and wonderful that she feels like she knows him even if he doesn't know himself. Her friends - when she returns to them - think she is naive and silly for running off and spending a night with a man she has just met, one who has essentially confessed to being a terrorist.

And though she never says it outright, she never really doubts him, doesn't actually believe him either. Instead, she trusts him to be the person she thinks he is.

He makes her feel interesting and confident, and she - in turn - gives him her ears and hands and feet and voice to help him in his search for truth and memory. And as events unfold and things get dangerous, he proves himself to be exactly who she believed him to be.

For in the chaos of mystery and meaningless violence, he is the one who keeps a level head, the one who stands up and makes it all right again, all the while exuding a purposeful kind of conviction, always keeping his head high, his heart light.

And as the story nears its zenith, as all good stories do, they stand together, the girl and her prince on the precipice of darkness that encroaches when the book closes. But when she looks up to him, smiling, she sees the empty confusion in his eyes and knows it doesn't end here atop a damaged mall roof with a defunct but circling carousel nearby and 20,000 naked men fighting their way to join them.

It can't end, not now . . . not until he can look at her with recognition once more.

Word: Incoherent