Chapter 130 - Dark

AETHER SOMNUS RODRIGUEZ'S POV:-

I turned my emotions back on and the first thing that happened was…

"Aaaaaaa…" my voice echoed all over the house as I lost control over my actions. It started with a scary feeling that creeped into my skin followed by a cooling sensation that made me numb.

My heart started beating rapidly as my stability completely broke down. My body started shivering terribly, and then I almost lost my sanity before I finally passed out.

Waking up, the entire process repeated again, once, twice, thrice...and over and over and over.

A week after the periodic attack, I woke up...not in my room, but in a completely dark place. I wanted to cry, but for some reason I felt really calm about everything. 

'Did I die?' was the first question I asked myself. The silence continued for a few minutes before I heard a low volume voice muzzling something…

"You okay?" This time it was much clearer than before. Since the voice was all over the place, I didn't bother looking in its direction, but proceeded to answer his question.

"Don't know," I spoke. I really did not know whether I was okay or not. I am calm now but I know that my emotions are blocked by something or else I would have been crying all over the place.

"Where am I?" I moved to the next question before the voice could ask me anything.

"You're in your consciousness." It answered.

"My consciousness? I didn't die? Or is it a procedure before death or something?" I ask with slight amazement. 

"You aren't dead, you are just unconscious after repeated psychological attacks," it answered.

"Who are you?" If it was my consciousness, then what was the voice doing in it...but I already knew the answer.

"I am your alter ego. You created me due to your trauma," he said.

An alter ego, huh? Well, I have imagined about my other half, and its qualities at times to the point of defining its each like and dislike. Never knew it could actually develop into one.

"So, what are we going to do here? Is there a way to wake me up?" I had a thousand questions, but for some reason, I felt like I already knew the answers to them, so I skipped to the very last question I had.

"You can, but are you sure you want to wake up?" He spoke again. Well, given my current condition, I knew it was not feasible at all. What should we do then?...Let's start with changing ourselves for starters. 

I think as I observe the whole situation and ask, 

"What's your name...no let's call you Dark, since it's all I could see for now. So Dark, what can you do? Can you keep my emotions locked after I wake up?" I ask him. It's not the right solution, but for now, that is all I can do about it.

"Yes...but rather than just keeping your emotions in check, I will also  block your memories of half the things that happened and most of the things that you felt." He spoke and I pondered over it before nodding on it.

Then he replayed everything that happened from the time on the ship to up till now and we discussed what to erase and what to keep. After discussing it a couple of times, I finally reached a conclusion and marked everything as done.

"Wake me up," I said and everything turned back to normal as my eyes opened to find my mother and father looking at me with tears in their eyes. It felt quite odd, honestly. I looked at them for a few moments before smiling at them, at which they made a terrified expression and my mother even screamed at me.

'They must be thinking that I have gone insane.'

Since I could not explain everything, I pretended to act as if my memories were lost, which actually made them quite relieved. 

For the next 2 weeks, many things happened as I still pretended to be having my memory loss but at a certain party I actually revealed that I knew who killed Clay.

The doctors once again came to check on me, but I only smiled at them for a few moments before I saw Layla and a small idea came to mind.

Asking Layla to go with me for an outing on the school trip. I planned to take her to our usual spot.

We had a small quarrel and then we made up. After that, I enjoyed the scenery as I reminisced about the times I spent with Clay. After I reached the resort, I ate lunch with Layla and took her to our usual hideout. 

In the hideout, I opened up my emotions slightly as I told her about everything that happened on the boat, at least the part which I still remembered. As I reached the end, she jumped and hugged me tightly and I hugged her back. It was a warm feeling that I was missing for the last few weeks. I honestly felt glad that I brought Layla here and told her everything that happened. 

I then spent some time with her, explaining things about the hideout of what we did here and how much fun we had in this place.

At some point I started getting teary and at others Layla broke down and I had to console her. 

'Well, not everything is lost, it seems. Looks like I can still start feeling once again. Thank you, Layla, for being with me during these times. I wish I could someday tell mother and father too, without worrying about them.' I thought as I looked at her with a smile on my face.

I then looked at the time as I realised that it's almost sunset time. 

I then asked her to wait before I went to the basement and took out the small gift I had prepared for her prehand as her birthday passed last month. I searched for it and found it exactly where I left it. Taking it out, I reached back to Layla only to find her missing…

"Layla?"