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remember me to one who lives there
he was once a true love of mine
If alchemy was a sacred pursuit, and the highest pinnacle, the Magnus Opum was the creation of true life, then Hikaru was a pilgrim on his way to the most hallowed high.
It had been two weeks since he had last seen Mei.
He was a creature of porcelain and clay, beautiful and inhuman and incomplete.
He gazed at the distant sun in the sky, directly overhead. It would be a long trek, and the nearest city was far away. He knew the others would be worried, but this was something he needed to do himself.
After all, they’d need everything they had to keep Mei alive.
Hikaru would do anything to save Mei, and if it meant that he’d never return, then so be it.
…
He’d liberated Mei from a dungeon of those like himself, alchemists who tinkered with poisons and metals to achieve first chrysopoeia and then the rest. Hikaru was skilled with poisons and medicines, but had no talent for transmutation and certainly not for the Magnus Opum, the achievement of immortality and true life.
“No sign of Nasu,” Thief Kyoko called out, shaking her head as she opened up the last room in the dungeon they hadn’t checked, her pointed ears twitching as she almost instinctively hurled a knife at a dying chimera’s dog head with a sickening crunch.
They’d been tipped off that he was here, so Hikaru assembled the party to go forth, at least, everyone who’d been free. He’d been hoping to get Piichi, being as he was the best fighter he knew, but Piichi was off on his honeymoon with that cute baker they’d met a while back, and only the gods knew where their unreliable bard or their hound of a gunslinger were.
Ranger Kimie had been the first to point him out, her brash barking voice sounding clear through the dungeon. “Hikaru,” she’d said, her companion hamsters disappearing into her rough russet robes as she slung her bow. “Are ya sure there weren’t people down here?”
“Nasu never took live victims,” Hikaru replied. Party mage Shiori had found that out the hard way, and was in the corner of the corridor, artificer Makoto helping her cleanse the vomit from her mouth. “Only corpses to experiment on. Why?”
Kimie’s eyebrows furrowed in deep concern, and Hikaru knew there was something wrong.
“Sirius says he found someone moving.”
At that, Hikaru’s eyes widened, and he rushed towards the room where Sirius had found someone. He was praying it was someone they could save, someone they could do something about, and not someone who could only receive a small, final mercy.
What he found was a naked human-like shape, a body half-comprised of clean porcelain and rough clay around his chest, his arms and all, and the rest resembling soft, supple skin, like an incomplete doll, an effigy of man left half-finished.
He gazed up at Kimie and Hikaru through vibrant red eyes through a curtain of flaxen hair, a pleading look in his eyes.
“Help,” he uttered in a soft, weak voice, before collapsing onto the stone floor, an odd sound of flesh and ceramic meeting cobblestone.
It was over for Hikaru.
…
When they’d nursed him back to health and gave him some clothes – he seemed to prefer the clothes of the women to borrowing anything of Hikaru’s - they learned he was called Mei.
He’d been the last and greatest attempt by Nasu to achieve that pinnacle of alchemical genius, a homunculus, grown in a putrefied womb of a horse, shaped from earthenware and kept in a caul saturated with blood drained from corpses.
Nasu had succeeded and was intending to improve upon him after disposing of him, but his lab servant – a young man Mei called Okuto – had protected him, hiding him away in an alcove. He was a kind man, Mei had recounted, who liked to draw.
At some point a few days ago, Mei had stopped hearing noises in the dungeon.
Waiting to break out, he waited, hoping that none of Nasu’s other creations had stayed around, but perhaps he’d waited too long, or a flaw of his anatomy had rendered him too weak, and that was when Hikaru’s party had found him.
“Ya got any idea where he might’ve gone?” Kimie inquired through a mouthful of roast chicken as the party sat around a roaring campfire, the tents and baggage being the only thing visible beyond the miles and miles of verdant grassland around them.
“Nasu never spoke about anywhere else he went,” Mei replied, softly shaking his head. “If he has anywhere else to go, then I don’t know.”
Hikaru looked deep in thought. Nasu had been his superior in the alchemist’s guild, long ago. He’d always talked about the laboratories he’d had hidden around the land.
He’d grown up thinking they were places of wonder where their shared craft was to be advanced. Now, all he could imagine were the horrors that were the final moments of those within them.
“I just hope Okuto is safe,” Mei continued. “He deserves better than that man. If I could have given him that, I-“
“I think I might know where to go,” Hikaru interjected. “We’ll find him for you, Mei. We’ll make sure Okuto is safe.”
Mei beheld him gingerly across the flame.
“Are you…certain?”
Something tender and sweet behind Mei’s eyes caused Hikaru’s heart to flutter, and he looked away, unable to meet his gaze.
“We’ll save him,” he repeated, his voice quieter. He exhaled, trying to meet his gaze properly. “Yes, we’ll save him.”
That one, he said with gusto.
Mei seemed relieved at that, and flashed a small smile. “Thank you. If you can do that, then…”
He gazed into the distance. “Where is the nearest city from here? I can take care of myself. I can-“
“You don’t need to leave!” Hikaru said suddenly, catching the attention of Mei, Kimie and even Shiori, who was off nearby, reading a book. All eyes of everyone at the campsite were suddenly on Hikaru, and he could feel himself heating up under the collar.
He cleared his throat, calming himself. “I-I mean…you can stay with us.”
“I couldn’t. I don’t want to owe you a debt I can’t repay, Hikaru.”
“Don’t think of this as a debt. We’re an adventuring guild, and we always need new members. My sister quit a while back to get married to someone we rescued a few quests ago,” Hikaru explained. “So….if you wanted to stay with us, there’s room, and there’d be room anyway.”
Mei tapped his chin thoughtfully. Hikaru didn’t know why yet, but he was hoping he’d reconsider leaving.
Mei flashed a soft smile, and Hikaru had his answer.
“Fine then. I’ll stay until we rescue Okuto.”
tell him to make me a cambric shirt
parsley sage rosemary and thyme
It had been one month since Hikaru had last seen Mei.
This time, he was sure he was close, and no amount of dolls or assassins or alchemical monsters woulds top him.
Wait for me, he implored the golem he’d given his heart to though he knew he couldn’t hear him. Please. Just a little longer.
…
Mei grew to be an important part of the party.
He was no fighter, unlike the rest of the party, even if Kimie and Makoto left something to be desired as combatants, but he was good at everything. Cooking, cleaning, grooming horses, chatting up shopkeepers, calming down angry city guards – Mei had a charm about him that made it difficult to be angry with him.
Homunculi didn’t need sleep or drink or food, but if there was something Mei enjoyed, it was food, and lots of it. Hikaru almost screamed once at realizing that one quest bounty had been eaten through by Mei almost the second they got to a tavern, something Mei had sheepishly atoned for.
He’d grown from quiet and withdrawn to a vivacious, almost mischievous being in the few months they had been together, and Hikaru felt drawn to that like a moth to a flame. He saved him time and time again during battle, and in turn, Mei saved him in the battlefield of society.
Hikaru couldn’t help but steal looks and glances at him from time to time. He couldn’t help but find himself drawn to Mei. He didn’t know if homunculi could even feel any sort of way about normal humans or elves or dwarves or anyone else, really, and then he cursed himself for having that thought because it was wrong.
Was it wrong to pick up homunculi in a dungeon?
These were not questions Hikaru knew the answer to, and it hadn’t helped that Leo had been reduced to a blubbering, barking mess the mere second he’d laid eyes on Mei. Which, in all fairness, had been a typical reaction to Mei doing much of anything.
“Hey, Hikaru,” Mei said, shaking Hikaru out of his reverie. It was a bright day, by a babbling clear brook. They were taking a break for the moment, and the rest of the party was asleep, taking a quick nap to enjoy the warmth of the spring. Hikaru had agreed to keep watch and Mei stayed with him – after all, he didn’t need sleep – just in case some would-be thieves would make their way to them.
“Yes?”
“Do you mind if I ask you a personal question?”
“Sure,” Hikaru cautiously answered. “Fire away.”
“Have you ever thought about getting married?”
At that moment, if Hikaru had been drinking something, he’d have spat it out.
“What?! What kind of question is that?”
Mei giggled, and Hikaru found it hard not to turn a little red at how cute it sounded. “I just thought I’d ask, you know. You’re a strapping man, and it’s been on my mind, what with everything going on.”
Yes, it was true that everyone in the party was finding someone.
Piichi had gotten married to that baker – Marin, her name was – and apparently they were expecting a child soon. Hikaru had caught Kimie and Kyoko kissing one night after a particularly successful dungeon clear and subsequent celebration at the tavern and the two of them had since been more openly affectionate after explaining the situation. Makoto wasn’t even with them this time because she’d found someone of her own she wanted to spend a while with, and Hikaru was certain that the bookish young prince they’d rescued was writing Shiori in private, to say nothing of Chinatsu quitting the guild entirely to join the Iron Clan after their stint in the Iron Clan’s homeland and fighting back to back with the young man who had risen to become its leader. He was pretty sure even Genya had found someone. Or multiple someones – he didn’t question it.
“Well…I guess I have,” he gingerly replied. “Hard not to.”
“Oh? You have your eye on anyone we know?”
Hikaru shook his head. “Who even would that be?”
“Well, it’s not like Kimie wouldn’t have gone for it if she’d known you might be interested. She was sniffing around you like a dog with a bone, but Kyoko beat you to the punch,” Mei replied. “Shiori also definitely had a thing for you. In fact, I’m pretty sure half the party had something for you at some point.”
“Seriously?” At that, the young alchemist looked baffled. He’d never quite thought of himself as the catch. “…how did you pick all of that up?
“Call it natural intuition,” Mei said, a teasing tone to his voice. “You really don’t know how attractive you are, don’t you?”
“I’ve never thought of myself as attractive, and I’ve never really thought about marriage before recently.”
“Would you like…help?”
“Help? What do you mean by that?”
“Well, I am a golem of many skills,” Mei answered confidently. “Surely one of them must be finding you a good partner.”
Why not you, Hikaru heard a small voice in himself cry out, and he found it strangely hard to push it down.
“It’s settled, then. I’ll be helping you find someone!”
“Wait, when did we agree to that?!” Hikaru almost sputtered, but he found a finger – warm and soft and porcelain – placed to his lips as Mei stared into his eyes. It was now that the alchemist found that Mei was standing up, a booted leg pinning itself at the tree trunk Hikaru had been using as a backrest.
He felt his breath catch and he could swear his breeches felt real uncomfortably tight for reasons he was fine with not explaining.
Mei was breathtaking.
He leaned in close enough that Hikaru could smell him as his hair fell in curtains around his face, smelling of flowers and earth and clay in a pleasant way, like a well-tended garden.
“I told you, Hikaru, I don’t like owing people,” Mei continued, his normally soft and effeminate voice taking a deep, firm undertone. “Think of this as payback for all the times you and everyone else have had my back. And payment in advance for rescuing Okuto, of course.”
Hikaru gazed back at him, deep blue eyes meeting ruby red, dead silent.
“You…have never owed me,” Hikaru reassured him, but Mei shook his head.
“You don’t get to decide that,” Mei answered. “Please. Let me do this for you, Hikaru. Seeing you happy…that would make us even.”
Hikaru swore he’d never felt his heart beat so quickly before.
without no seams nor needlework
then he’ll be a true love of mine
It had been nearly two months since Hikaru had last seen Mei.
He knew he was in the right place because the entrance to the underground complex, a deformed mound of stone and wood, was crawling with chimeric abominations, half-formed monsters and dolls. Walking porcelain and clay humanoids bearing weapons that had all the life Mei didn’t have right now and Hikaru was hoping to give to him.
Behind all of them was Nasu, and with him was the salvation to Hikaru’s soul.
Hikaru glanced at the potions in his hands. Poisonous, risky, but strong concoctions these were, meant to make one stronger at the cost of one’s lifespan.
His life, however, lay miles away, with his vitality barely being held together by the combined effort of all of his friends.
….
“We did it,” Kimie tried to cheer, but the exhaustion had gotten to her, and what would’ve been a roar of victory came out as more a meek purr of light triumph. “…guh.”
She hung her head down as Sirius clambered onto the back of her head, trying to get across in squeaks what his mistress could not in words.
Somehow, they’d beaten the giant clockwork puppet without losing anyone. Somehow.
Genya was already sitting down and enjoying a cup of tea, his lute lying flat on the ground as he looked serene as anything, a contrast to Shiori lying face-down on the ground, groaning, Kyoko supporting Kimie with an arm around her shoulder, and an unconscious Leo being quietly tended to by the water-wielding mercenary they’d picked up recently. – he’d taken the worst of it, and Shiori was pretty sure he wouldn’t wake up for a while.
And Okuto was safe. Still in a cage, tired, a little starved, but alive.
By some miracle, Hikaru and Mei were the only ones who weren’t too tired or wounded to stand.
Hikaru slumped back against a rock, wiping sweat from his brow. “We got him back. We…really got him back.”
“I always thought we would. More importantly, I’m telling you, you did this, the princess will be all yours,” Mei answered. “I mean, saving the day is nice, but you being the dashing hero will really do wonders for your eligibility as a bachelor.”
“We finally saved your friend and you’re trying to hook me up.”
“Saving Okuto was the goal,” Mei chided him. “Getting you a wife is a luxury.”
“Well, who says I’d want a wife?”
Mei lifted an eyebrow. “I can work with men too. The king has a son, you know.”
Why not you, that voice said in Hikaru’s subconscious again, and he was finding it significantly harder to ignore it.
“Who said I wanted to marry a prince?” Hikaru retorted. “You know, maybe my eye’s on someone a little closer than that.”
Mei grinned. “Oh? Who might that be, then?” The homunculus broke into a peal of laughter, looking at Hikaru’s embarrassed expression.
Hikaru opened his mouth to reply. He wasn’t sure if he was going to say “none of your business”, “you’ll find out”, or even “please, Mei, shut up, it’s you, I want you, I love you”.
He didn’t say any of that and let out a cry of horror as Mei’s laughter broke into coughs, and those coughs let out clotted blood, before Mei crumpled to the ground, Kimie and Okuto’s screams following shortly after.
…
“He wasn’t completed,” Toshiro warned him as Mei lay in an infirmary, trembling feverishly with his eyes closed. Hikaru was the only one of the party in the infirmary; he’d insisted that Kimie and the rest wait outside, especially since he didn’t trust them to not jump Toshiro. They had had a long history.
He wasn’t sure he trusted him either, but he was the only hope he had.
“Wasn’t completed?”
“You’re an alchemist. You should know this,” Toshiro lightly chided him. “Did you never figure that out from the fact he was incomplete? Mei is imperfect, and the animating force behind him is draining from him.”
“I know that, but shouldn’t healing be able to do something about that? Shiori and I-“
“No. You two aren’t strong enough to fix this. Your healing is like trying to plug a hole in a dam with a wine cork,” Toshiro bluntly replied, before nodding to his assistant as she passed him some more medicines. “Thank you, Byakko.”
The fox-eared nurse simply nodded quietly, before walking off. He turned back to Hikaru.
“What kind of alchemist are you that can’t even figure something like that out?”
“Damn it, that’s why I went to you!” he snapped. “I know I didn’t finish my training under Nasu, but can you blame me? After what he did?”
Toshiro’s silence was all the answer Hikaru needed. For all the differences they’d had in the past, they knew that they’d do anything for those they cared for.
Hikaru breathed in deeply to collect himself. “Is there…anything I can do?”
“If my sources are correct, and they usually are,” Toshiro said with not a small amount of arrogance. “Nasu is working on an elixir of life. Now, such things are impossible by normal alchemical science, but given he got this close to making a perfect homunculus, I don’t put it past him.
“And if I get that, will it save Mei?”
“If you get it and it works.”
“How long?”
“Two months. I’m not an alchemist, but I know how people’s bodies work. And don’t think you’re the only one who understands what it’s like to feel desperation.”
Too many ifs for Hikaru’s liking.
Not enough ifs to deter him.
He steeled himself.
“Tell me where.”
tell him to find me an acre of land
parsley sage rosemary and thyme
Hikaru’s hands were covered in blood, gold, red and black, and his body stank of sulfur and arsenic and blood and sweat. Behind him, mountains of corpses and shattered pottery remained as he stole towards his former master.
“You should have followed in my teachings, Hikaru.”
His cold voice would have sent shudders down Hikaru’s spine in any other context, but not here and not now.
“In the event of an encounter with a superior opponent, don’t strike back.”
A foul stench of vitriol filled the air as needles and wire hurtled through the air, but Hikaru was faster; all the medicines and concoctions he’d taken made him fast enough.
“Are you so desperate to save that doll’s life that you’d throw your own away so easily? We are on the same side here, are we not? Why do you persist?”
Hikaru intended to give him neither quarter nor response, because it was the only way.
Between Hikaru and the elixir of life stood his former master.
Between Hikaru and his future stood his former master.
Between Hikaru and Mei stood his former master.
….
“Yer crazy if ya think we’re gonna let ya go off on your own!” Kimie snapped at Hikaru, as they collected outside of the infirmary where Mei clung to life by a thin thread. “We’re a team, aren’t we? Mei’s our friend too!”
“Don’t you trust us?” Shiori interjected, her voice quiet but strong. “We’ve been through so much together. At least let us get you most of the way there.”
“…no, it’s not trust,” Hikaru admitted, shaking his head. “It’s just…it makes more sense if one of us goes. Nasu saw us coming because there were so many of us the last time. I’m not going to give him the chance to slip away this time.”
“We barely survived his big puppet and you want to come and take him alone?” It was Kyoko’s turn to get involved. “Listen, I know you love Mei, but-“
“I didn’t say I loved him-“
“Well, you definitely don’t hate him,” the elf thief snappily retorted. “You don’t have to do this on your own, but…”
She gazed over at Kimie, then back at Hikaru, before sighing. The ranger looked alarmed.
“What’s that look for, Kyoko?”
“He has a point,” she conceded resignedly. “If we all go, Nasu will see us all coming and bolt. We don’t have time to mess this up. Two months seems like a while, but one or two days delay might be enough.”
“We can’t just let him walk into the lion’s den like that, dammit!”
At this point, Shiori produced a small scroll from the depths of her robes, handing it to Hikaru. He studied it closely. “What’s this?”
“A Scroll of Return. When you use it, it’ll send you back here.”
Kimie turned to her in shock. “Not you too!”
“You know Hikaru as well as I do, he won’t quit, and he’d do the same for all of us. I agree with him and Kyoko,” the magician admitted. “I don’t like it either, but it’s the best chance we have of saving Mei.”
Utterly defeated, the ranger slumped down onto the ground, head in her hands as her hamsters came forth to try vainly to comfort her.
“Damn it,” she spat. “I wish I could do more. I can at least tell ya in what direction to start looking and do some scouting for ya, but…”
Kimie fixed Hikaru with a firm gaze, but it was little more than pomp and circumstance.
“Ya better come back,” she uttered firmly, clearly trying to bite back tears. “Ya better come back to us, ya hear? You and Mei…you two better be happy together.”
He tried to smile.
“I swear. I’ll come back.”
He’d make sure at least that the elixir that would save Mei would return. His own safe return was optional.
…
Moonlight steadily poured through the infirmary late that night as Hikaru stood vigil over Mei’s unconscious body. Okuto was asleep in a chair on the opposite side, robes draped over himself like a blanket. Hikaru couldn’t suppress a smile – he’d have done the same for his sister. In another world, perhaps, they were truly brothers.
It was the last moment of peace he was giving himself. Maybe the last one he’d get ever.
He held Mei’s limp hand in his own. It was soft, cold and felt like earthenware more than the flesh of a living man.
He wished he’d get the opportunity to hold it again.
Lightly, gently, Hikaru squeezed his hand.
“I’ll make this right, Mei,” he promised. “And then, when I’m back, I’ll…”
Tell you the truth? Continue down the way we were? Say nothing?
He never finished that sentence.
The alchemist stood up, lightly depositing Mei’s hand back to its original position, and he disappeared off into the night, never noticing the weak movements of the bedbound man’s arm towards him, nor of his name being called in a hoarse whisper.
…
Two months later, a single cry echoed out from somewhere in the wilderness, silenced by toxins and desperation.
Two months later, an alchemist met his end.
Two months later, a quest had failed.
between the salt water and the sea strand
then he’ll be a true love of mine
Kimie and Okuto stood vigil over Mei’s unconscious body. Leo had still not woken up, but he was at least getting better, while the others were drinking their sorrows away.
Hikaru hadn’t been heard from in two months.
“He’s gonna come back,” Kimie said, trying to keep a brave face about it all. At this point, she wasn’t even sure she convinced herself, let alone Okuto.
Mei had gotten worse in the intervening two months. Where previously lively flesh once was, now was as pale as the porcelain patches. The earthen clay that comprised some of him had begun to crumble. His closed eyes concealed a fitful sleep, and he groaned in pain as the animating force that had brought him to life ebbed to its final threads.
He was almost out of time.
Okuto tried to say something, but there was nothing left to say. The two of them continued to watch, praying against all hope that they would not witness Mei’s final breaths, not tonight, but as his breathing grew more labored and no sign of Hikaru was to be seen, hope was fading fast.
His breathing slowed.
And then-
A loud booming crack pushed open the doors to the infirmary, but it might as well have shattered the world as the remaining two looked up.
Hikaru had returned.
One arm hung limp, riddled with scratches, wounds and blotchy skin. The other, however, bore a blood-stained flask with silvery fluid.
Not a word was spoken as he limped and trudged his way towards Mei, not a sound in the hall as he popped open the flask, lightly tipping Mei’s mouth open and guiding the flask’s contents into him, and not a peep was made as he slumped in a chair next to Kimie, waiting for it to work its magic.
Flesh slowly began to spread across his body, porcelain and clay being covered with skin that began to regain its color and the fitfulness of his rest began to calm. At first, it seemed like he was getting better, especially as he looked healthier, even more so than he ever had, but then-
“His breathing,” Okuto uttered, first in confusion, then shock. “His breathing is slowing. Why is his breathing slowing?!”
“No,” Kimie said in disbelief, staring at Hikaru. “Are you-“
“Positive. That’s the elixir Nasu was working on.”
“Then…” The ranger stopped mid-speech as she stared between the alchemist and the homunculus. “We were too late…”
And then it stopped.
A second. Then two. Then three.
It was over.
Mei was gone.
Okuto inhaled sharply, trying to resist the urge to cry. Kimie, being who she was, failed utterly, beginning to cry into her sleeve.
Hikaru stared in desolate horror at the seemingly inanimate body of the man he had fought fate for. After all that, after it all seemed like he’d gotten back in time, he watched it crumble before his eyes. He was too tired after all that to cry, to break down, to do anything but stare in shock.
But there was one gesture he could still make.
Slowly, he leaned over Mei, pressing his lips gently on his cheek. He’d never do him the disservice, even in this state, of kissing him on the lips, after all.
And then-
Okuto was the first one to pick up on it, but Hikaru was the first one to stop what he was doing.
“Wait,” the young man stated. “Did-“
“I heard that too,” Hikaru replied, his voice betraying the disbelief he had.
“What?” Kimie interjected, still sniffling. “I didn’t…I didn’t hear anything…”
“I said…you are a poor kisser.”
It was hoarse, barely above a whisper, but it might as well have been clearer than the ringing of church bells.
Mei’s eyes slowly fluttered open, as his hand grasped onto Hikaru’s sleeve.
“You really need to give those kinds of kisses gusto, you know,” he teased him, even as he seemed to struggle with every word. “How would your lucky partner know you loved them otherwise?”
“Mei!” Hikaru exclaimed, his voice almost breaking with the mixture of emotions. “How? Why-I don’t…huh?”
“I needed a second to get everything all back in order, I think,” he explained, releasing a groan as he stretched muscles and bones that had just knitted themselves back together. “I don’t know. I’m not an alchemist.”
“You were dead!”
“I got better. Everything still hurts, though, so please be gentle.”
“You’re telling me,” Hikaru retorted, his body still bearing the trophies of his fight against Nasu. Something, however, occurred to him. “Wait, you don’t care about the kiss? Does that mean you…”
Mei flashed a crooked smile, and Hikaru had his answer, as the rest of the party flooded back in to witness the miracle.
“We’re just going to have to learn how to do that properly next time, partner.”
he was once is a true love of mine