On the wall

Aimlessly Mads sat slouchingly at the coffee-table, rolling a coin back and forth with the index-finger of his right hand, small droplets of blood from his palm staining the once tasteless leaf-green tablecloth.
In front of him was a letter, of the highly suspicious sort, something he'd found in the boxes when he moved to Seoul to be closer to his Syndicate.
He grabbed the cup of coffee and sat up as he moved it to his mouth, quickly realising it was still far too hot, regardless of how much time he felt had passed.
His tongue still stinging his eyes ran down the letter, stained in coagulated blood, straining to read the awful handwriting.

"Dear Mads,

Let's get the kliche out of the way: If you read this, you either found it before I could get to you, or I never got the chance.
There, if I know you well enough, that made your toes cringe, but don't worry - I'll try to avoid any more.

I'm writing this before I forget, forget the reason why I have to write this.
I trained, hard, to be able to do what I do, something I taught you - but you probably don't remember that, we were drunk whenever we trained together.
If it was succesful, I'm sure you've impressed a lot of people, made them notice you. You remember that? How you longed for recognition?
We are pathetic beings, really. Striving to perfect an art just to impress, not to become something greater.

I guess you have a lot of questions, so let me answer them with questions of my own:
How's your blood doing?
By the appearence of this letter, I guess you're either thinking I wrote this right after your fathers attempt, or if you still know the art, that we share an affinity.
You remember when we were young? How your dad killed me?
Yeah, since you probably can't remember me - after all, you never called - I guess I have to tell you; he didn't. Not well enough, in any case.

Where are you hiding these days?
Part of the reason why I'm writing this letter, is because I haven't been able to find you. Your apartment was completely dressed in coagulated blood, strange part was no footprints lead out of the place.. At all..
Just crimson splatters of blood along the hallway. Your things were still there, so maybe you went on a binge again.. I'll drop by later today and hide the letter somewhere, something tells me it's best I tell you all this in person, but just in case you dissapear for good...
I made a discovery about our art, something you need to know.. Something about the one who saved us..
Oh, she didn't tell you? She saved me as well as you from your dad.. Come to think of it, maybe it wasn't the drink alone that erased your memory of me..
Everytime i showed up, you always gazed at me with this blank, dead expression, but your eyes always came back to life after a few minutes, only to go dead again as I was about to leave..

Oh well, in any case, I'm on my way out.. I'm coming, my friend.. I'll find you, even if you don't remember me when I do.

Ah, and the comment about being pathetic? Who knows, maybe that's changed by the time you read this.
Either way, I assure you we won't be pathetic once I tell you what I have to share.

Eternally yours,
Arkian"

Mads gulped down the coffee and lit a cigarette...
It wasn't so much that the letter contained knowledge regarding everything about him, a lot of people could have written that - he was quite open about himself. Or that it leaped in time, from describing events as if they happened yesterday, to years ago..

The odd thing was, Arkian wasn't real.. He was imaginary.. a childhood friend.

The longer the words reverberated inside his skull, the more doubt set in.
Hadn't those been the words of his mother?
"Arkian isn't real, Mads, he's in here." She'd said, pressing her hand against his chest smiling.

What was stranger still were that his father had killed him, using his knowledge of Chaos - odd for a templar, but still, he had managed to manifest and exorcise Arkian from his mind, and murdered him in front of his eyes.

At least.. that's what mother used to tell him.

He poured a new cup of coffee, slouched back down and rolled the coin back and forth once more.
Sitting for what felt like hours, he finally sat back up, moving to take a sip of coffee, burning his tongue.

His eyes ran down the letter...