Oh boy as if Aiden wasn't confused enough already. There's a lot to unpack here and for starters I would like to say, be careful how you deal with the extraction of Creative Sparks. I don't know about you, but I tend to think these Sparks as the manifestation of one's soul and spirit. Unclear if it is the soul/spirit itself or more of the interface with it, a physical manifestation of what is entirely non-physical, but either way I would say that stealing one's Creative Spark is not much different than stealing their soul (and spirit). While memories themselves are physically kept in the brain, meaning that as long as you have the body you can still remember things, it is a bit dangerous to play with characters who lose their soul and still live. I don't know what you've got in mind for Future Charles, but I think the loss of that could mean anything from becoming brain dead out of your brain mimicking the lack of a mental orchestrator (you stop to think basically), still being operational but lacking emotion, still being alive and seeming to act as if you think and feel, but actually having no consciousness (philosophical zombie)... which I'm not sure if that'd have any direct implications other than bringing in philosophical questions on how different is an organic machine from a human. And maybe more variations depending on how you interpret the effect of being on Imagination support. Basically, I think it's a rather complicated matter with a lot of philosophical questions attached and depends a lot on how we understand Creative Sparks and how we understand souls. We could dicuss about it, but no matter how you decide to handle it, I just hope you don't have people like Charles just be the exact same where losing their soul ends up meaning smuck.
For Aiden's case specifically I guess having the Flumberfluff body, but the Teenyweeny CS means something along the lines of keeping the young Aiden memories due to the brain (and also having some of the old Aiden memories I suppose seeing as it's already established that a CS can carry information about that and leak someone else's memories into you), but actually having the soul/CS of old Aiden. That again gets very philosophical and metaphysical where one asks, assuming we have souls in the first place because let's not get into that part of the debate, do our souls influence the way we feel emotions and think thoughts? Is our brain partially shaped by something beyond matter that could be switched and then bring some of one person's character into another? Or is a soul merely a person's perception, the consciousness; what translates neural signals into feelings and thoughts, but has no role in shaping those and they are merely shaped by the brain? It's all very complicated and I don't think we're gonna solve it, but I suppose for the sake of stories we're probably going for something closer to the former where the soul affects the person. That would mean that at least to a certain extent Future Aiden's personality might come out on top. Don't know what you've got planned and I don't know if my saying all that is going to influence that at all, but just sharing my thoughts.
I very much like how you show young Aiden (sort of) remembering the memories of old Aiden in a way that it takes a bit for the reader to figure out what's going on. I didn't remember the SOTS scene that well, so maybe it took me a bit longer to realise than it could have, but it was pretty cool. I'm also a fan of showing perceiving people's memories through their eyes, as it should be, unlike what other media often shows.
Once again the chapter was very confusing, though a little less so towards the end, yet interesing at the same time. Emerald and the inward dimension are intriguing and the fact that two sets of memories are clashing while we're seeing all that makes exploring all that all the more fun, if somewhat disorienting.
Also, two-three years passed? Well, in reality I don't know if it's the same time that passed Flumberfluff, but another big question that still remains is what the hecc's happened to Aiden's body all the while. I'm pretty sure it was in critical condition even without the Creative Spark being stolen, so the fact that Aiden's going back makes me wonder what he'll find on the other side. Also, if 3 years really passed, is his body even still alive? In fact what does it mean Aiden taking 3 years to go back? If it was 3 years to recover from his injuries and almost dying, but being back in his body the entire time I'd understand that, but I don't think that's exactly what you mean as Aiden only woke up in well whatever the inward dimension is supposed to be.
I suppose I'll wait and see how you explain all that. I do hope Aiden gets his CS back though.