[He stills, eyes going unfocused for a moment as the options that Kirigiri presents seem to take shape in his subconscious, and in his mind's eye he catches a glimpse of a pair of school uniforms, one pink and one green — two boys, side by side —
One of them, he remembers, made that very wish: I want you to live for me. The other...is the one who screamed no, who said take me instead, who —
Who in the end, found the way for all of them to live on, together.
Which sort of person is the woman in the bed? Maybe he can't answer that question yet. But he knows what sort of person each of those two boys were, and it sends him reeling from the memory and the magnitude of the recognition.]
She's not either one of them.
[In the bed, the woman sits bolt upright, like she's been shocked, and Fawkes's voice is low.]
no subject
One of them, he remembers, made that very wish: I want you to live for me.
The other...is the one who screamed no, who said take me instead, who —
Who in the end, found the way for all of them to live on, together.
Which sort of person is the woman in the bed? Maybe he can't answer that question yet. But he knows what sort of person each of those two boys were, and it sends him reeling from the memory and the magnitude of the recognition.]
She's not either one of them.
[In the bed, the woman sits bolt upright, like she's been shocked, and Fawkes's voice is low.]
And she is not my mother.