First they are small and innocent. Covered in yellow and blue, and because of this, green as well. Paint coating fingers and fingers touching paper…. They have grown, but only a little. This time they are covered in red, but the red is not paint. I am crying, and my mother is cleaning the red away. Soon after, that hurtful red is replaced by a clean and soothing white. The pain begins to fade, and I wipe away the tears. They grew again. This time they’re covered in bruises. Angry purple marks that cover my knuckles and palms. Someone is yelling at me, and I am yelling back, arms open and fingers splayed to make myself as big as possible. My bruised and battered hands clench into angry, defiant fists and a voice behind me cries out in fear. New hands reach for me, hands that are not my own, and I throw myself forward to protect- My hands again. One on paper, the other with a pen. I sign my [name?] and someone takes the paper away. I stand and walk to another room. My left hand pins itself to my side, and I raise the other to issue a vow…! [promise?] The words fall from my lips like seeds, rich with conviction and innocence of this oath yet unfulfilled. I think the seeds were planted in my hands…. I’m holding a book. Studying. The words are unclear, but I can see the ridges of my fingerprints as my hands cradle the pages. I turn a page, gently. Books are frail things and hands, I have learned, are instruments of terrible power. I mustn’t tear the pages. A rifle now, though it is not real; it’s a harmless thing, molded from black plastic. My hands are still there, gripping the shaped weapon tightly as I take aim at my target. I shout words, and the target does not obey. The false weapon becomes a true weapon as I swing the butt of the rifle at my foe, and while the blow is not meant to harm, the target drops. Relief as the exercise ends, and my hands relax…. My hands are covered slick oil now. I’m cleaning a rifle, but this one is real and cold and deadly. This weapon is clearer than my clothes, the book, or the promise. I can remember the names for all the parts, too. But still, my hands are clearer than everything else. I’m putting the weapon back together, returning it to its final form, a thing made for killing. My hands are so dirty…. Sand in my gloves, irritating my palms. My fingertips are free. They twitch as I struggle not to move. Can’t be seen now. Too much to lose. This is no exercise, and lives could be lost…! [They could DIE!] I can never wash these sullied hands! Worse than oil, or bruises, or paint! I am crying again, but the blood on my hands is not my own this time. I reach down with those same bruised hands and try again to beat life into his chest but someone else pulls me back. His eyes can’t see but they watch me as I’m dragged away screaming pain into the world. There is shame on these hands and it cannot be cleansed away! Clean skin. No more blood. But I can still feel it, seeping into the ridges of my fingers, the creases of my palms, between the joints and the knuckles. The blood will always be there, intermingled with the shame and the sorrow. I press my hands to my face and weep, and even the tears cannot clean them. No more hands this time. They’re gone, but I remember them, every crease and wrinkle. I lay here and I know the blood and sorrow are still with me, but no matter how I try it will not go away. I tried to make it leave. Tried to cover the shame and sorrow and blood by fighting. I tried to keep the promise, a promise I broke when I soaked those seedling hands in the blood of the friend I could not save. But there is another way, they tell me. They can help me. They can clean the blood away. They reach for me, but their hands are sullied, too and I only learn this too late as the world goes black. The new hands are clean, they say. I know better, but still. These hands are strong. I can fight with these hands. They are no longer seedling hands. Now they are saplings, young and strong and ready to grow into something more. I cannot wash away the blood and shame, but I can atone for it. There is still pain, but it is dulled. They hand me a rifle, but now I am more a weapon than the gun. I am an instrument. x-x-x-x-x [b]Just a thing. I originally imagined it being Tac's memories, from before she was a Guardian, but I suppose it could apply to almost any Exo who was a soldier first.[/b]