Chapter Text
{Your cheek is pressed against the pseudo-hardwood floor. You have no knowledge of how you got here, only a somewhat unpleasant, sticky feeling on your face as you peel yourself off the ground. That, and the unnatural grogginess, but that’s becoming ordinary.}
[Over on your desk, a notification flickers off, a missed call. Fuck. You make a mental note to text him back.]
{But first… you have a story to tell, don’t you? It lingers over you, their hands on your shoulders, their breath on your neck.}
---
(That all will come in time. For now, you must go back. I’m sorry, Love, but you must go back.)
---
{You couldn’t handle it. Again.}
(What was it exactly? I thought I knew, but I got it wrong.)
[Who fucking cares, all you know is that you were miserable.]
(Reality slipped away from you, satin ribbon in the hand of your sister, snapping under the tension, until you smelled salt air. Tile gave way to sand as you retreated into yourself, into someone else’s memory.)
{Her memory.}
[Try not to think about it.]
Alright, alright. I admit it, I fell back into you. You three, not… not her. The dripping of the faucet became the rush of waves, the powder of crushed pills became sand, and I could breathe a little easier.
It’s not like anyone needed me out there at the moment. Our body fell limp, and I stood there, on my side of the dividing wall between war and memory.
Or I thought I did, but there it was before me. I didn’t realize that’d move the barrier so far. No, I… after all that effort I spent setting up that labyrinth, why would I let you out here? This was my space, forever temperate.
---
I had so much to say. Someone said I should try journaling… again. So I did. I sat there, in my head, and thought of all the things I’d say to her. Yes, I know it’s pointless. Every word I penned pulled the color from me, drip by inky drip, until I sat drained next to the only notebook I’ve ever filled.
And then I fucking threw that thing into the ocean. And I woke up from this nightmare, just before you did.
[So then I… wait a second. You didn't stay?]
No. I had a life to get back to, a life to ruin. I couldn’t keep coming back here. I swore it off. Cold tile replaced warm sand, and I rose from the bathroom floor.
---
{Except you didn’t stay gone.}
Except I didn’t stay gone. You’re right.
No, one night I had the brilliant idea to come waltzing back here, tripping on my own ego. And I danced alone under the Lunar Eclipse, somehow missing the clock eye under me. Did you three even notice the Eclipse? Did you even notice when Heart blinked out of your world?
Because I noticed him come tumbling back into mine, if just for a moment.
(The pills!)
Those were mine. But no, you couldn’t stomach the taste, so you filled our mouth with your poison.
(I was only trying to help you!)
I stumbled into the surf, our body desperately purging the stuff.
See, I can tell you now, “I retched”, but that doesn’t capture everything. No, I was motionless for four hours. Four hours. Of course, time doesn’t pass here, but four hours. My thoughts turned to… prayers. I was already on my knees, and the words they force-fed to me as a child came spewing forth. All I asked for was for a swifter end than this.
Please, make it stop. Whoever's out there, take your fucking shot.
---
And then suddenly it stopped.
And as I wiped my mouth, my fingers brushed against something solid in the sand. I pulled it out, the ebony box.
Very funny. The jewelry box I… borrowed for playing pretend, here now years later, containing a cure.
---
(I remember. Love, I remember our games. Where did you go? Why?)
Hush.
---
I admit, I considered it. Not for very long, but the thought was there, weighty in my hand.
I don’t know what convinced me to let it go. Stubbornness? Spite? Maybe it was just that the pills finally kicked in. But I did let go. I waded out until I was waist deep in that water, and let the box sink.
---
[That’s the one thing you seem to be good at - throwing things away.]
(You can’t build an identity if all you do is cut away. You’re more hole than Whole.)
Quiet, we’re getting there.
---
I stayed in Reality for some time after. I scarcely thought of you three. I didn’t need to. I never needed to.
([Bullshit.])
Whatever.
---
Another quiet evening, and I felt myself slipping. The view from the balcony, the murky blues and greys bleeding back into that realm. Cloudy skies gave way to my Stars.
{I needed you.}
And so I came. You saw me there. You know. You remember everything I said.
But this was, and is, not my place. I can’t keep coming back here, I can’t stay hidden in my own head.
{So you abandoned me again.}
I left you something, at least.
{It wasn’t enough.}
I never am.
---
But now it comes back to you. Try as I might, it comes back to you three.
Shall I let you three take it from here?
---
(I sat on the floor of my room, practicing rudiments, feeling nothing.)
[I turned back towards the house, blinking away tears from looking at her, feeling lost.]
{I crossed the hall, headed towards Heart, palms still bloody, feeling everything.}
---
(Drumsticks fell to the floor as my door opened.)
{Rage subsided as I finally got a proper look at you. I hadn’t clearly seen you since the incident.}
(I held my breath as you stepped closer. Death would finally come for me.)
{I needed to do what he would hate. I crouched beside you, and as my first act as LORD…}
{I pardoned you.}
(You forgave me.)
---
(I think you were crying, Soul.)
{So were you!}
[You both were, I could hear your pathetic sobbing from the living room.]
---
[I saw Soul’s door was open, an unusual and unsettling sight. I walked past Heart’s room, on the way to my own, and saw you two there, embracing one another.]
[I could see red streaks on Heart’s hoodie, but I would not intervene. It didn't seem like a fight, and I was under orders to leave Heart to rot.]
{That’s what he would want, and I wasn’t listening to him anymore.}
(I asked you both to think about it. He wanted silence from us, and he left us here to die.)
{And we, idiots, the three of us, played his game. We tore ourselves apart, and for what?}
[Before I could voice my concerns, the Sunlight peaking through the blinds spoke to me.]
(The hangnail Moon too.)
{And the Earth.}
[({[({[({SILENCE})]})]})]
---
[I still can’t believe I didn’t see it sooner.]
(I can.)
[Shut up. I still saved your ungrateful ass.]
{Seriously, you two? You’re making this hard to follow.}
[Exactly. Heart, quit interrupting.]
---
{The Earth began to shake.}
[And I grabbed you both, tossing you out the window.]
(Which fucking hurt, by the way.)
[The house was collapsing, Heart. I didn’t have time to be gentle.]
{Some warning would have been nice, but we’re digressing.}
[The Sun blinked out, as did the Moon, leaving us in near-perfect darkness, with only the Stars overhead.]
{I tried to tell you both, but no. No, you had to listen to those delusions.}
[It… seemed reasonable at the time.]
(Fucking liar. There was no logic to it, you just liked how she sang.)
[It sounded like her, okay! That was the only thing I liked about that girl. And she actually listened to me, unlike some people!]
{We’re trying to tell a story here! Fucking hell, can you two stop fighting?!}
(You started this! You called us delusional!)
{You were! Never mind. As you two wrestled in the snow, I watched as the ground before us fell away. A massive hole swallowed the house, the cracks in the Earth coming closer, closer.}
[I could have gotten us to safety, if Heart hadn’t tackled me.]
(No you couldn’t have! It was too sudden, and you couldn’t see. You’d have gotten us killed.)
[We can’t die! You yourself are proof of that!]
{Anyways! I was the first to fall, you two soon after.}
[In the fall, your claws ripped my wings.]
(An accident! I keep telling you, it was an accident!)
[I pushed you off of me, which… in retrospect was a mistake.]
(Because we were separated?)
[Because I could have used you to soften my fall.]
(Bastard.)
---
{And that was the last I saw of you two.}
[For a few weeks! Don’t be so dramatic.]
(It wasn't even a few weeks, more like an hour or so. It wasn’t real time.)
{Would you shut up about the real time thing, Mister Moon?!}
[Says the once-winged man who thought we were in the real world despite living with a dragon and a bug.]
{Fuck off.}
---
(We all hit the ground hard, I imagine. I did at least. The next thing I felt was stone brick and a throbbing ache.)
[The geology of that plateau never made any sense, yet to think that it was hollow...]
(It didn’t have to make sense! This wasn’t Reality.)
{But it was determined to kill us.}
[Or at least keep us apart.]
(Nothing could keep us apart for very long.)
[Except apathy. Everything I had worked to maintain was ruined. My wings were torn. I was stranded in the dark.]
{You gave up immediately? I at least tried to navigate the endless passageways for a week or so, but without my trident, I could hardly walk.}
(Okay, fine. Nothing could keep me from finding you two. Darkness, light, it’s all the same to me. I walked through corridor after corridor, endless halls of mossy stone, calling out to you.)
{It still took you ages to find me.}
(It took us longer to find Mind, remember?)
[...]
(Mind?)
[Nothing.]
(Bullshit. No more secrets, you promised!)
[...]
{You did promise, Mind.}
[Fine. I didn’t want to be found. I’d hear you two coming and run.]
(Fucking WHAT.)
---
This is why I don’t let you three tell your own stories. You keep getting in fights.
{YOU can fuck off! You’ve tried to drown us out for long enough! You abandoned me! You rigged a false Sun, Moon, and Earth to get us to kill each other!}
Whoa, hey, Soul. Calm the fuck down.
(Can we get back to the point where Mind said he had us chasing him for two weeks in that labyrinth?)
[Like you didn’t hide in a pit for a month.]
(HIDE IN A PIT?!)
---
{Anyways! We found Mind, and then our way to the outer edge of the labyrinth. Behind a loose brick was packed Earth, behind that was freedom.}
(I could hear thunder outside.)
[The storm I foresaw had come, Spring along with it.]
(I tunneled us out of there, which took a day.)
{And you sang that damn song the entire time.}
(Would it have pleased you to listen to thunder instead?!)
[At least you know he was listening.]
---
[It still was dark outside when you broke through. The Sun would not return, not until I submitted to her.]
{And it was wet. We were standing in an inch of water.}
[We were basically at sea level, so the entire terrain was flooded.]
(I started to wonder why I dug out of the labyrinth in the first place. What did I think would happen? Why did I even try?)
---
{But I knew. I think we all knew.}
[(The border.)]
{Exactly. So, with my sick, unsightly ids by my side, I ran to the edge.}
(Rude.)
[Running is the wrong term. And you were the sick one, I had to carry you.]
{Guys…}
(He’s not wrong, Soul. Your condition had only gotten worse with all the dust in the labyrinth.)
{...}
(We slowly trudged through the mud for three days.)
[At least it was warmer now. If it were still Winter, we wouldn’t have made it.]
(You wouldn’t have made it, more like.)
[Like you’d leave me behind.]
---
{We finally were back there, at the beach.}
[It wasn’t raining here. We could finally dry off… if there was only a bit of Sun.]
(The wind helped minutely, and we needed the rest.)
---
(When we awoke, I had an idea.)
[An idiotic one at that.]
(But the only real idea we had.)
{I still don’t understand the mechanics behind it.}
[It was before my time, I had no idea what you were talking about.]
(I told you, you are him. Or you are how he was, before he became that. It was your ship.)
{That doesn’t… never mind. Somehow, the... boat that you and he built came back to shore.}
(You're so dismissive. A ship fit for a mighty pirate appeared before us.)
[Ship is a strong term. It was a bundle of logs tied together, a raft straight out of a children’s book.]
(You didn’t have anything better. What, did you want to swim to the border?)
[It doesn’t have a sail! It’s not a ship!]
{I think you two were having this exact argument when I collapsed.}
[It gave us a fright. It took both of us to pull you aboard.]
---
(Mind, do you want to tell them about our time adrift?)
[What?]
(It’s part of the story, isn’t it?)
[No?]
{I don’t remember. I was delirious.}
(I know. But Mind and I had a real heart to Heart.)
[If you want me to tell them that I apologized for lying at the tribunal, then fine. I apologized for lying at the tribunal.]
(And then you said I’m amazing and wonderful and that you love me so much and…)
[No I did not!]
(But you felt it. You were thinking it. You've been thinking it this entire time.)
[The only thing on my Mind was Soul. I was worried about him.]
(So was I. He lay with his head in my lap for most of the time at sea.)
{I’m surprised you didn’t throw me overboard.}
(I’m surprised I was still alive, after everything.)
[You…had proved useful, Heart.]
(You mean it?!)
Heartwarming. Can we continue the plot? I’m getting antsy.
(Well, I’d still like you to remember that moment, the three of us lying next to one another, gently rocked by the waves, watching the stars overhead.)
[Moment remembered. Can we move on?]
(I wonder why I love you sometimes.)
---
{Our raft drifted to that wall of fog.}
(His border, keeping him out.)
[His border, keeping us in.]
{His border, and it needed to come down. It called for holy light.}
[I was calling for any light. The only thing visible was my wings.]
{And the Stars overhead.}
[Your Stars, if you wanted them to be.]
They were mine.
{What’s yours is Mine.}
(I was proud of you, even if I couldn’t see what was happening. You’d been so afraid of the border for so long.)
And for good reason.
{And that "good reason" of yours was exactly why I did what I did. I didn't care if it killed all four of us.}
[The light was blinding. We’d spent so long in the dark, the sudden flare-red of your wings stung.]
(I could feel the heat. I hadn’t realized how cold I was. I wish I could have seen it.)
{They only lasted a moment, just long enough for the fog to part.}
---
(And then I could see again. I could see the mess on the floor, and all the empty bottles. I could see our hands.)
My hands.
[({Our hands.})]
… our hands.
[Did you just repaint?]
No, new apartment. They must have painted before I moved in.
[Humph.]
So, gents, now that you’re here… would you mind going back?
{Ab…}
(You’re out of tune.)
{Huh?}
Huh?
(The bass in the corner. It’s out of tune. And you’re being an asshole. I told you, we can’t be Harmonious without all of us. You’ve got to re-tune, not us.)
Please?
{As I was saying, absolutely not! For once, I can stand on my own.}
You’re not standing. I’m standing. You’re just hovering in the back of my head.
{Which is where we belong.}
[You can’t force us back, Whole. Or should I say…]
(Shh, quiet. Do you hear that?)
---
Hear what, exactly?
{Peace. Harmony. Whole finally being Whole again. All the things you wanted.}
(No, someone’s calling you.)
[Who is that? I want to know.]
… someone new. I’ll... introduce you.