What Captain Zaven said, he didn't know the mans past, not at all really. It must have been endlessly dark, because so far everything that had haunted over Cobborns mind had been calmly accepted any time those thoughts he wasn't so proud of leaked out. This time it wouldn't be a leak, nor was this a moment of weakness, nor an accident. Yugos hand was a comfort, something he desperately wanted. ~Thank you. I don't know if the information is fragmented memories that never left, or a strange nightmare that refuses to leave. If this is more information that will help or not.~ These words were signed slowly, trying to be careful to not to move the hand from himself. ~Sorry for fussing so much. Despite the many years of learning about the human mind to heal myself, sharing this is still hard for me. I'll start now.~ Of course as seen before, mastering information didn't always mean you applied it to yourself. This was perhaps why it could be said that doctors make terrible patients. Though learned enough to be a healer of the mind, he was quite poor at applying those lessons to himself. Besides that, most of this happened while he was small and vulnerable. Any learning of the mind happened long after what haunted them, after all it was some of the reasons they went to seek that knowledge.

Their hands wrapped around Yugos hand after he was finished speaking. This was as much physical contact as he started creating different hues of greys and black, creating a monochrome colored scene from different types of coals using their magic. The different types and qualities were all used to try to craft the scenery and people as accurately as possible with the use of magic and their own memories. Though everything and everyone looked carved, there was enough detail that it gave the feel that it might have been a real event. The carbon matter created a scene that was a bit different than what one might expect from such a detail oriented person trying to play a memory back. The scenery wasn't as wide, bits of it fading in and out from having shape. Maybe it was because the memories were old, or perhaps it was just a miracle it existed at all. It would be easy to doubt its existence if you didn't know where the location was, nor had you seen seen all the people in it after the event. There were many reasons the young man was unsure, but every bit of information mattered, right? One of the people in the vision was a beautiful woman with an hourglass figure. Even with a ratty cloak over her the nobility and charm dripped from every bit of her figure, long straight hair that even dragged a bit against the ground with its length.

Considering one of the things that allow hair length was diet, this detail alone certainly made her look to be a noble who could afford such luxuries. Not a single blemish on the skin anywhere, showing she had never done any hard labor in her life. Not ever her long and perfectly groomed nails had a sign that she ever lifted a finger. The only way she could pull off looking like anything but a beautiful noble in that cloak was if those around her didn't know how to spot such details, or simply wanted to stay out of the affairs of nobility. The clothes she had on under the cloak were quite plain, the expression on her face looking quite bored. This person was the operatic singer known as the burning crimson. She stood in a wooden house near the doorway, trying to call a child to her. There was a man next to the child with long braided hair, glasses, and dress clothing that seemed a bit messy on his person. Everything in the house that could be seen was a bit messy everywhere. He had a strong build, despite the mousy bookish overall look to their person. /Are you sure you want to go on your own to take him to the doctor? You're quite sickly and he has next to no stamina. I know you're his mother and I love you, but you aren't careful enough with him./ The mans mouth had moved, but no sound came out.

Only those who could read lips would be able to understand the words. From Josephs expression, it seemed he couldn't, despite being the one creating that very scene with the use of his carbon matter magic. The woman furrowed her brows before crossing her arms. /Love, I birthed him/ Her mouth moved soundlessly, an insulted look on her face.
/Barely/ The mans mouth moved briefly before picking up the small child. He had been standing near the man with wobbly legs before they had been scooped up. With his tiny appearance, they were likely around four or five. Despite the slightly chubby look, the child seemed to be lacking in either weight or muscle.
She unfolded her arms, her face loosening in its expression. /I wasn't trying to kill him, it can just be hard to get myself to stop working./ The man paused at those words, eyes glancing from the woman to the child. It seemed he was deep in thought. /Did the color his eyes make you feel guilty? I almost thought-/ Lips stopped moving briefly, their grip fluctuating a bit. /Sorry. As long as both of you return home safely, as long as nothing bad happens to him I'll continue trusting you./

It was after that details became a bit more choppy. It cut to the child being on the floor again, standing, the other saying something in sign language, speaking with the child that way. It was far too cut up to tell what had been said. During that spot, it seemed much of the womans body had been covered with blobs of carbon matter. There was clearly a good amount of memory missing from that part, but what mattered is what could be remembered. What was missing very likely couldn't be forcefully pried out anytime soon. It probably wasn't too important, but the next part was. Sadly, it was also missing chunks. Where was the mother taking Joseph? The beautiful operatic singer that had been known as burning crimson while she had been alive. It seemed she was going all over town, typically not by foot. It also seemed like she made the child go on foot whenever she could, despite how easily exhausted he seemed to get. She had started Hapshass, but wherever she ended up wasn't that city. Having the memories so chopped up of the traveling was likely due to the tired state she seemed to keep him in during the traveling. It made that part faster, but it would also make figuring out where she had gone to that much harder. At the end, she seemed to be walking towards an old brick building covered in old vines that looked a bit decayed from abandonment, but nothing was falling apart yet.

Finally, the child sat in the dirt. It seemed even as a quiet and obedient toddler, the little boy had enough. ~Mama, I’m tired. It hurts. Do you hate me? Daddy said... doctor, going doctor. This isn't a doctor. I don't like it. I wanna go home. I miss daddy.~ The woman stared at the child who was trying their best to speak in sign language, disgust and annoyance growing on her face. /I hate every time people act like its my fault you're this way, like me thinking for myself is a bad thing. I would rather die doing what I love than to even try to learn your crippled hand talk. I refused to learn it as a child, I wont do it as an adult here either. You are my successor, you aren't allowed to be a cripple. If that means your lifespan becomes like mine, than its your own fault./
It was clear from the lack of sound that Joseph of back then could not hear her. With how he didn't seem to physically react to what she was saying, he certainly couldn't lipread. The child panted in silence, the woman looking more and more outraged. She was practically shaking when a man came from behind her, picking the child up. He was dressed in a dress shirt, plain clothes, and his hair was tied in a long loose pony tail. They were a musician and certainly looked related to the man the child had been latched onto earlier. /I'll carry the unruly child the rest of the way there. He was just saying he was tired and scared. He'll forget any of this ever happened in a few days./ The woman didn't seem that satisfied, but her anger did start to dissipate. Her shaking slowly stopped before starting to follow the man towards the old looking building. The tiny child was terrified, but didn't struggle. It wasn't uncommon for kids to simply listen to adults, even while scared. The younger and less experienced, the better.

Inside the building was a bit dirty, but there wasn't dust anywhere. Maybe it was just a mistake in the modeling? A detail too fine to add, but Joseph seemed capable of adding that sort of detail through white coal powder whenever he made his normal maps. He was capable of adding the detail, but hadn't. Inside there was a man sitting in a chair, seeming to be waiting for something. /Is everything set? If we don't have his fresh corpse than your child can't be fixed. New vocal cords and the fun things around the ear canal don't grow on trees and can't be healed away by magic./ The mans mouth moved silently, their eyes focusing on the woman. She nodded, giving a bit of a smile. /It was harder to modify the kids hair color to hide them from being found by any of that mans family on Fintans behalf than it was to get his attention. All I had to do was tell him where to find that son of his that he was so certain I had./ Even though her words couldn't be heard, her body language started expressing itself like she was thinking about something that had been especially difficult or annoying. Maybe it was both. /I don't care what plans you have with the child or what you do with him, so long as he can be my successor. That boy is currently useless to me./ The man in the chair looked amused by whatever the words she said had been.

/How hard has Fintan hunted for that little one?/ The man in the chair straightened himself out, looking more focused. His hair was short and unkempt, a long coat with quite a few pockets being worn on them. Every pocket looked filled with something. He had glasses on, but they had the look of a magical item rather than just normal glasses. The man with the long hair put the child down. /I need to head out for work. The less time I spend here, the less likely any knights are going to poke their head into any of this, or my brother./ The woman laughed as the man had started to walk away, her entire body leaning a bit into it. If there had been any doubt about laughter due to the lack of sound, her posture had certainly helped remedy that mistake. /My husbands a pacifist, so his worries and threats are useless, no matter how strong or smart./ Her mouth moved without sound, her lips would likely be a bit harder to read this time due to the bits of laughter that had still been coming from her lips. She didn't care how strong or smart her husband was when it came to this situation. He could be as strong as a mountain and sharper than the finest blade for all she cared. A blade that wont strike might as well be the dullest and most rusted blade. The man that had just left the building in the scene had been Josephs uncle.

~I wanna go home.~ The child signed, his legs shaking a bit. His breathing was slow, but a little haggard for someone so small. The mans focus zoomed on the child before tapping on the rim of their glasses. After that, he started moving their hands to use sign language. ~I am the Doctor that will help you speak and hear. Even if you don't want it, I’ve already been paid. My lord has plans for you after your recovery and your mother has agreed to it. You can call me Weasel, because that's as close to my real name as you will ever get.~ The child seemed to dislike that answer, trying to back away. His mother grabbed their shirt, giving the child a dirty look. /Fintans family have been ruthlessly searching. Its to the point where I don't know if changing his eye and hair will be enough to keep him not noticed, even being married to a commoner and hiding that I have a kid at all might not be enough. Hopefully after he dies the rest of his family will consider him delusional about having had a son./ The child kept his eyes on the man, not looking at the movements of his mothers mouth. Still, it had to have been noticed to make it into the memory. ~You're scary, I don't like you. I wanna go to daddy.~ The child signed, his eyes starting to water a bit. Of course even a naïve child would be scared of this sort of presence.

The strange man had the aura of a predator that enjoyed hunting and killing, a far cry from the feel of a kind or helpful doctor that one should trust. ~You're smarter than you're mom at seeing danger. Turning five pretty soon, right? Too young, too small, and too sickly to get anywhere away from me. Thank your mother for that last part, even trustworthy doctors will back me up on that part.~ The doctor didn't seem to have thought highly of the operatic singers sense of danger. /Your child will need to be drugged and treated. You have birthed a child will will become a gifted sensory mage, but if he blooms too fast or too much too soon than it will be harder to manipulate him. Make him believe he was born with a different magic. That combined with the changing of the senses while he heals and the drugs will create a new reality where even your fabrications can feel or seem more real than the actual thing. Disconnect him from himself. He is too much of a thinker, he has too much of that royal family in him, his fathers bloodline completely took over. It's no wonder his element is carbon matter with a sound oddity, he will never willingly follow the path you want him to. Even with drugs, I do not believe he will ever pick the life of a musician. He will never choose sound./

/I believe you can change that. I'll be back in a few hours./ With that the woman pushed the child towards the man, causing them to fall over. She quickly turned and walked away. Burning crimson took a broom out as she approached the door, not hesitating for a single second. The child tried to get up, but it wasn't quick enough to mean anything. By the time he was back on their feet, the woman was gone from the building. Weasel stood up from the chair as the young child started to move towards the door. While the child seemed to be slowly getting into a panic, the adult calmly quickly walked over. It seemed effortless how quickly they grabbed onto the child. This only made sense, just as the panic and the welling tears in the childs face. The man seemed only to gain joy from this. He slowly let go of the childs shirt, staring with a lazy but amused expression. ~I would enjoy hunting you down if you try to run, its just too bad I can't hurt you. My master would be quite upset if you lost any blood before surgery, as it would decrease your chances of survival.~ It seemed the child was starting to understand the nightmare he was in. They stopped crying, but panic didn't leave their face. ~Please, let me go to daddy.~ The man wasn't phased by this suggestion, still with an expression akin to a cat playing with a caught mouse.

~You already know the answer to that. Now, follow along if you don't want to be dragged along. Its fine if you go slow.~ The child looked at the man more before looking at the doorway again, than back at the man. The childs head did this a few times before slowly walking over. He did not touch the man, though clearly physical support would have helped. The child was not even slightly quick, but the doctor seemed to not be bothered in the slightest. Inside the building was a long hallway with a lot of closed doors. Getting close to one of the doors showed no label or marking at all. It was a design set to confuse those who entered, not that such a small child had any idea of this. The lack of label did seem to confuse the tiny child after passing three doors without any markings, all the same space apart, both with the same door and handle design. ~How do you not get lost Mr bad guy? Everything looks the same so far.~ The stranger stared at the child, tapping their own glasses rims a bit with one slender finger before signing out a very simple answer. ~That's the point.~ The child looked even more confused and frantic, though didn't exactly try to bolt anywhere. ~I don't get it. You scare me.~ If anyone was expecting anything complicated from a kid so young, they would be disappointed.

Such things at that time had been beyond their understanding, outside that it seemed scary and the man seemed scary. Eventually they stopped at a door, Weasel carefully opening it. ~Get in the room and sit on that table. I'm going to get some tools and cleaning materials from another room, but will be back shortly.~ The child looked around a bit, getting a lost expression on their face for a brief moment before walking towards where they had been told to enter. The room seemed oddly clean, but also seemed to have better lighting than the hallways. There was a table with cloth over it as well as a door in the back of the room. At the sides were shelves covered in boxes, covered jars, and items covered in fabric. Small eyes looked around as they walked towards the table. This seemed to be enough evidence for Weasel that the child was going to do as told, since he closed the door after seeing this. Big young eyes looked towards the door, the child walking around the table as they made their way towards the back door. They hadn't been running, which was probably better for someone who could not hear how loudly they were stepping. Inside the room seemed to be censored even in the memories, but whatever had been there must have been terrible. Tiny bits of carbon matter skimmed off him, the child screaming and looking horrified.

No sound seemed to be heard, not just in the memories. Nobody was rushing to the door, indicating no sound was heard. The small child saw something else in the room, a rusted bar window at the back of that room. Their tiny legs started to dash, their body trembling in pain as they did so. The child was breathing erratically, sobbing a bit, and avoiding stepping on what the mind had censored out. This changed when almost making it to the window. The only way for the child to reach it was to step on a pile, a tall pile. He had paused, panicking for a moment before lunging themselves at the window. For a few moments nothing was censored. It had been a room full of childrens corpses at varying stages of decay. Their entire tiny body hit the rusted bars, causing some of the bars to simply fall off. Certainly that meant it had needed to be replaced for a long time, but this was a good thing for the child. He started to squeeze more of their body through the small opening. It was difficult, but he managed to get most of themselves through before one of Weasels hands reached out for him. They grabbed one of the childs shoes, an item quickly abandoned by the tiny child. With that he tried his best to tun away, though a thick fog seemed to have rolled in.

This was clearly an illusion spell cast to effect the sense of sight, not that a child so young would have noticed something like that. The fog was displayed in the carbon matter display as a coal powder that was spread like a fog. This wasn't perfect, but it was better than nothing. The child ran, even with only one shoe. They clearly couldn’t see past the fog, as the memory showed. The scared child still kept running until there was nothing left in them. It didn't take long for that to happen, considering both the age and their poor health should have been expected. The child was in terror, without a body that would do what they wanted. A clearing cut through the thick fog. All sides near the clearing started to dissipate. The clearing ended at the boy and started at a man a good distance away. Their hair was as curly and wild as the toddlers. It was a bit strange for the same type of wild hair to be on two people, there it was. The man had a crimson lions mantel on and seemed to be dressed like they were fully expecting to run into a fight. The man seemed as surprised as the child when the two looked at each other. The man seemed to be speaking and signing at thew same time, looking quite excited. ~I'm your blood father! I've been looking for you for so long! I'll take you away from here to somewhere safe!~ They were likely speaking loudly, how they signed even seemed a bit loud.

What happened next was likely quite predictable. It would have been nice if that man could have reached the child, but it wouldn't make sense with the current events that had lined up in the story being silently told. They did start to run towards the child. The kid in turn still couldn't really walk, the exhaustion didn't vanish. But they weren't trying to get away either. A figure in a long hooded robe swept towards the man that had started to run towards the tiny child. There was a look of shock as who was likely Fintan reached for their sword while being attacked. He was launched far passed the clearing that had been slowly getting bigger, a blood trail being left in their wake. The scene didn't need color to signify it from what had just occurred. The small child started to look panicked, eying the blood in the distance. He tried to walk, but ended up falling. Weasel seemed to have made their way to behind the child, a moist piece of cloth in one hand. The man certainly seemed annoyed, probably hadn't expected the child to make an attempt to escape that wasn't laughable. They grabbed up the child, putting the moist cloth over the mouth and nose. As one might expect, a child with very little stamina that had already been worn out past any limits they had wasn't going to be fighting back.

Deep breaths. The carbon matter vanished, for some reason as a full grown adult there were quite a few emotions going through him at that moment. ~Sorry, I'm not finished. I just need a second. I don't even know if those things happened, I don't know if there would be words coming from those peoples mouths if it had sound. There shouldn't have been a reaction from me.~ But because he couldn't read lips, it meant he had no idea what had been said through most of that, being kept in the dark in their own memories. He may not have realized it, but those were still memories, possibly the only ones not blocked out from trauma. Rather, it was the sort of thing that kept with you specifically because it was so scarring. No matter how unreal it seemed, those visions and feelings had haunted them. Joseph started taking deep and long breaths, the shaking in their hands slowly dissipating. The child of back then, he wasn't that anymore. He had more stamina and health, was older and could use a grimiore. He can hear and talk. There was a hand touching one of his. Yugo looked a bit different from when they first met, but it was still the same sweet and innocent person. He wanted to show everything else, but it didn't feel like he had the mental energy for that. This was frustrating.

~Sorry I can't show more at the moment. That was he main bit of important information that didn't make it into my report. Part of it was because there had been far more missing pieces until a few months ago, but also because I'm not sure if its a memory. The other pieces I know are memories, but for some reason I just feel so emotionally drained. My father slowly lost his mind and became more protective and violent. I was told this was caused by my mothers death, but I don't know if I should trust that narrative anymore. A lot of things I was told I have started to recently find out have been lies all along.~

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