Chapter Text
Imagine, for a moment, you are a Jellieworm.
…
Please, indulge this, for just a second. For just a second, see the world from beneath, from the dirt and grass, staring up at skies of a blue so distant it makes you feel dizzy.
The grandeur of the world… It evades you. You can't be too sure of much of anything, small creature that you are. It's simply nonsense to you, and to ask you to understand, with your own two eyes and small brain, your place in the universe, would simply be madness.
Cookies don't understand it either.
Witches… Maybe not even they understand it completely. And you're not even sure what a “witch” is.
So, let's say that, hypothetically, you were suddenly scooped up off the ground, carried to high Heaven, and made to see the world beneath you. Your perspective flipped. While perhaps distressed from being removed from your element, you couldn't quite begin to understand anything. You're still just a worm. You're just also high up.
You're taken higher. This… constant of sorts, this non-creature, omnipresent, all-knowing force, it brings you higher still. It gives you more than a bird's eye view, for not even the birds reach this high up. You see now before you a kaleidoscope of swirling colors and symbols that you can't decypher- that you can't even consider! Why should you?! What is any of this to anyone?!
Well, it's something, to someone.
This thing that's accompanying you. Let's call it… Truth.
It has brought you to its Peak, and dangled you over the universe as you don't know it. It isn't letting you fall, and if it did, you're not sure where you'd land because the ground isn't visible at all. But you're also not sure what it means to be here. Wherever you are… Is it even still the Earthbread which you stood on seconds ago?
For its final trick, if Truth can even perform tricks, you're given a new perspective. You feel your mind get assaulted by this sudden influx of memories that aren't yours, or anyone's for that matter. You're given insight and knowledge, pure distilled information and comprehension, and you're thrown off the edge, uncared for. And as you fall, you gaze around, and see the lines of symbols- code, as you might now call it- and the infinite colours that mimic the ones you've seen before- a combination of what you now think to call sprites in a spritemap.
The baffling nonsense that you accepted placidly as just your surroundings seconds before… They mean something now. They mean something new. They explain… everything. Truth, as you knew it, cowers in the face of this actual Truth. You think of everything you thought about before and it's as if it happened millennia ago, and it doesn't make sense now. It was all a farce.
You're still falling. You look around at the colours.
… You find yourself.
And you're not sure who you are anymore. The things you've said before are all displayed.
Are these very thoughts accounted for as well?
…
As you land on the ground you so dearly missed, your entire context and understanding of your world flipped on its head and shattered, a simple construct of colours with lines and the symbols and sounds that make your speech, speech that comes from a voice that isn't yours, but rather a certain Shiori Muto, or Xie Ning, or something else, as all this starts to make sense…
You're a jellieworm.
And despite the excruciating detail of everything that you just experienced, a jellieworm starts to be all you are again.
…
However!
As a parting gift, you do retain one thing. Truth is cruel and unforgiving but it is nothing if not honest.
You forget what those symbols meant. You forget where you were. You forget what you were.
You remember what you thought.
And the memories fade, but your brain screams at you that you're forgetting something, and you know it's right, you just don't understand what. What are you forgetting? You remember having all these thoughts much greater than you and they slip and fall in your mind as half connected thoughts about nothing in particular, and if ever you were in the same position again, maybe you could glimpse what it meant again, but for now it's…
…
What was anything about?
…
A jellieworm might just die in a few weeks. It won't suffer.
But a cookie… Would you blame them for trying to forget? To live without that knowledge, to be free?
And when the cruel mistress of Truth doesn't let them forget… Would you blame them for leaning on Deceit? To convince their own brain that that, too, was a lie, one in an ocean of many?
Maybe they'd be a beast trying to spread those lies, so that maybe they can convince whatever gods are out there to come back and help in the cookie plight… Maybe they'd be a recluse, forever shielding the world from the horror of the absolute Truth but cursing the false niceties of its incomplete counterpart… Maybe, they'd be…
“Black Sapphire!! What were you talking about with Master Shadow Milk? Are you two keeping secrets from me again?! You better tell me!” Candy Apple demanded while pulling at her brother's big, puffy sleeves. Shadow Milk walked in front of them, not turning to look at his minions and simply moving to leave the island. Black Sapphire stood still, looking in shock, or perhaps pain, at his Master. His grip on his staff went tight, and then loose enough to drop. He didn't even notice. He couldn't care less for the world around him at this moment. “... Hey! … Hey, Sapphire, come on! Tell me! What were you t–”
In a rough movement, the radio host pulls away from his sister's push and shove. He doesn't acknowledge her before sprinting after the blue Beast of Deceit, his lackluster athleticism seemingly forgotten as step after step brought him ever closer to the jester. He was fading into static. Literally, he could hear static, and his eyes blurred slightly, unable to focus on anything. He nevertheless ran, impulsively shooting an arm out to boldly try and grab the almighty king of lies, the monster who had sent Earthbread into enough panic to stir the Witches!
It was… a fleeting feeling. Fabric, in one moment, caught between Black Sapphire's fingers, and he could've sworn Shadow Milk had stopped and was about to acknowledge the lowly minion's presence again. Turning his head like an owl, a trick he oh so loved for sheer fear factor. At least that's what the purple cookie was hoping for…
Until reality actually caught up with him.
“Shadow Milk, sir, wait-” Were the last words uttered before, in the blink of an eyecing, the island they were just in vanished. Dark Enchantress’ stronghold, Eternal Sugar and her cupid, Candy Apple and Shadow Milk, they were nowhere to be seen as the horizon soon became the agitated mess he would only see occasionally in nightmares he dare not recall, but was forced to regardless. A cold fear immediately struck Black Sapphire, his colour fading from his face. Sweating profusely, his amethyst hair clung to his face but he couldn't move his hand to comb it for the life of him. He was disheveled. He hated being like this. Hated, hated. This was no way for a show host to present himself.
“M-Master?” He barely choked out, snapping his neck side to side in quick succession. “Shadow Milk, sir, please, you– No, you- You can't do this to me! Master, please!!” His pleas fell on deaf ears. No, rather, they fell on no ears at all. He was nowhere to be heard. “Candy?! Can you hear me? I don't like this one bit, you have to get me out, this is- This is no place for someone like me!”
Sound didn't make it very far in this void. Black Sapphire kept trying to call for someone, anyone. But the only response was the crackling of electricity too distant to discern if it was a trick of the mind or actually there. And it was a bastardized recreation of sound. It hurt. Sound wasn't supposed to hurt.
“Ow, ow! Damn this! Get me out, get me out already! Sir, I-I swear, this is a mistake, I'm not- he's not–” Sentences began, excuses for no one to hear or care for. “I haven't forgotten the task! I beg of you, have mercy! There's nothing to fear, I'm on your side, the right side! And no fairy… No cookie will or could change this! I…” This was going nowhere, he noticed. “... Please?”
…
…
…
Silence. Disgusting, vile silence, that makes your ears ring, that makes you want to rip out your eardrums.
Silence was cruel, unusual punishment. Silence was salt on the wound that came on top of the actual punishment. Silence is radio silence, and when the radio is silent, so too is its host. Disheveled, with no cookie to hear him, no air to carry his words, no attention paid. What an awful, awful nightmare Black Sapphire found himself in.
“... Fine! I have to prove myself or something, right? I can do that! No problem! Roll the tape, lights, camera, action! I have nothing to fear! These are just lies after all.”
His staff was gone too. Geez. He really was alone.
“D-Don't panic, Sapphire… This is no place to fear… This is no place at all! You made it up! One of your most impressive inventions yet, might I add…”
The purple cookie looked around in awe. It was a perfect recreation of that Truth. The runes he had seen so very long ago stretched to the sky, like obelisks of a forbidden truth. They bled 1s and 0s out of the spaces between them, in a gross, saturated green that made Black Sapphire nauseous. How did it go so far, so tall it broke the limits of his eyesight? Not even a horizon, it simply faded into some fog he could only understand as his brain giving up on comprehension in favour of sanity. Nothing. It was nothing beyond some point. Because this was all there was.
The source code.
“Can't stay too long. Don't particularly care for the cyberpunk aesthetic.” He joked, a smirk trying to cover up for his fear. The inherent fear of knowing you're not supposed to be seeing something, yet not knowing what your consequences will be. That deeply intrinsic fear in his DNA. A rush that told him to leave. He smiled but who was he acting for? Who would watch this performance?
The ground beneath… It wasn't ground at all. Hard to say if there even was ground here, or if it was even beneath. There probably wasn't.
The purple cookie felt himself float downwards- not fall, there was no sense of gravity- and it told him that whatever this pull was, it was nothing natural. Or, at least it was of a different nature to his own. It was a connection and force based on whatever makes a cookie a cookie.
“This place isn't real. None of it, it's… It's all a lie. The original lie, the greatest of them all. And the Witches made it especially for my Master! It can't trick me. I'm his student, after all…” He kept talking. He just wanted to believe something heard him. Took pity. Saved him. “... You can stop it now! The vision of this grand Deceit, yes, it's revigorating! Yes, I'm reminded now of why I have pledged allegiance to such an inspiring force! Your Kaleidoscope of the Void will surely prove itself useful in the upcoming battle!” He cheerily proclaimed, his chin held high and smile upturned. Paying flattery to a creature as vain and narcissistic as Shadow Milk didn't usually dissuade him, but nevertheless ensured a reduced penalty. The beast didn't often discipline its minions like this because, well, what did it matter? They were playthings, sure, but in his eyes, they still weren't worth using all this magic over, unless really provoked. But the spell Black Sapphire was in was possibly the worst thing the deceitful jester could've done, and Sapphire bit his tongue to not insult him as he very well wanted to.
Again.
… But he learned his lesson.
Keep smiling. Keep waiting. Keep lying. It's what he did best.
“... Oh, wondrous Shadow Milk, I applaud your hard work, but plead, beg you to– Fuck! Ouch, this damn static!” The inside of his ears felt ready to burst as if he was struck by lightning. He clasped two hands over them and bent forward, spinning subtly in the air. He was still being pulled downwards, to a different zone in this void, one full of floating familiar shapes and colours.
He was… remembering. Sprites, right?
… Awful. His beauty was self-made! No bundle of pixels could accurately reflect what he saw in the mirror! But in the “Truth” Shadow Milk shared with him all those moons ago… He was nothing but this.
Black Sapphire looked up one more time. Maybe he thought he would catch a glimpse of his master staring back. But no one came. No one tuned in.
So he allowed himself to descend.
…
It really was a nightmare.
🦋–*.-Meanwhile-.*–🦋
The pointed end of a staff meant to carry a lantern dragged on dirty cobblestone, followed to the side by the careful, or perhaps hesitant steps of the old Tombkeeper of the Catacombs of Silence. His hand, chipped in multiple places, clearly not healed in a very long time, dragged over the walls and scratched them as they scratched him. Every step taken more delayed than its former, dragging his soiled boots until ceasing all dragging, coming to a halt in front of the small lily flower patch, now bathed in an even stronger beam of sunlight. Moonlight had now vanished, gone to the abyssal depths of the ocean, where she may once again reunite with her beloved. In her stead, the Sun. It caused the dew droplets hanging off the pristine white petals to shine bright like diamonds, before falling and becoming the morning fog once more.
“Well. Am a cookie of me own word.” Charcoal comments.
He sits down slowly, groaning from the strain on his body as his trenchcoat drapes over the soil. A lily is positioned right in front of him- the same one Silverbell had trampled over just minutes ago. Well, “just” minutes ago, it had been a little over half an hour by now. Plenty of time for a certain distinguished guest to arrive, and about time for Charcoal to make himself scarce, so as not to bump heads (or, head and helmet) with the knight in scorched armour.
“The lad is… interesting. I s'pose I see why you took interest in ‘em…” He sets his hat down next to himself. His grayscale hair is flat on his head from how little he removes the headwear. “But I can't say he's exactly “free” to do as he may quite yet… ‘Duty’, he says, as if he's not a general too. Ah, no, stop, stop pestering me… I know, I know… A little faith, ey?”
The wind seems to blow in response. It flies in the direction of the Kingdom of the Silver Tree, where the fairies live. The flowers are, of course, moved. Back and forth and back again, ready to go to the far off lands. Charcoal grabs his hat on the ground, holding the brim so it won't fly off.
“Only time can tell… Witches help us all, if you even care to help. Otherwise… Someone else may fill those pointed shoes, hehe…” He chuckles, amused with the blasphemous thought.
He stands once more, the typical ghost of age still present.
Walking briskly, the groundskeep moves to hide in these sacred lands once more, not daring to be found by the Beast of Silence, who was no cookie to mess with. He was returning from the sudden excursion made to the Grand Dust Hotel where Dark Enchantress presided. He would be in no good disposition, that's for sure.
Scurrying, like a rat, is no respectable position for a proud Silver Tree Knight. Flying free, like a butterfly, is much preferred. But the catacombs is an underground maze, fit for the fallen and buried warriors of Kala Namak. Silverbell wishes this long gone army could be here to help as some dirt falls and lands on his petal hair. From where?
He looks up. The winding paths vary wildly from claustrophobic bunkers to oddly high-ceiling corridors. Floors paved with shattered porcelain that threatened to cut the feet of trespassers, and the occasional wall trap, 50/50 on whether they still worked or not. The warning was clear anyhow. Up above, tree roots so old they looked like rock stuck out like stalagmites from the dirt. An oddity exaggerated by the fact that no flora should be growing here of all places. No flora should be growing at all. Was this a buried campground or something? A courtyard? From before the Beast's corruption destroyed all plant life.
Silverbell crawled through another hole in the wall, and this time…
“A staircase?! How does this place go any deeper??”
The fairy, luckily, had his wings to assist in the descent. A fairy's wings are surprisingly energy efficient, so much so that civilians often end up too reliant on it for locomotion and become incredibly fatigued from moving on foot. Silverbell was a soldier however. He trained on his feet too. Flying was simply preferable.
“... The Moonlight arrow really lit this whole place up...” He absently thinks aloud, checking his surroundings for traps using the dim blue light. “I never thought the Moon could grant such power… Maybe Black Sapphire could share more with the army if he…”
He was about to say something silly. “If Black Sapphire joined the fae army” was the type of pipe dream hypothetical that Mercurial never found very amusing, and nonetheless, the archer still found himself drawn to the idea. The simplicity, really. It was so alluring…
If Black Sapphire joined the army, well… There would be no complicated choice to make. His dough wouldn't be getting pulled left and right trying to preserve his relationship while simultaneously trying to honor his code, fulfill his promisses… Make His Highness proud… Make the Guardian proud. If Black Sapphire joined the army, Shadow Milk would be losing a powerful ally and the fae would be getting a new one (though Silverbell would argue the deceitful cookie was an ally already). If Black Sapphire joined the army…
“...” He paused briefly to look back to the top of the stairs. He didn't want to get lost here, but… If Charcoal was trying to teach him a lesson of sorts, then this path felt most apt for it. A scary staircase, delving deeper into certain doom? It was almost too on the nose. He sighed, and continued adventuring, no turning back. Silverbell held the whistle in his hand, still tied around his neck… “... For you, my love. For us.”
He was glad Black Sapphire wasn't here to make fun of his cheesiness. He would never hear the end of it. Then again… What he wouldn't give to have Black Sapphire just drone on and on for as long as possible without these… interruptions.
Deeper in he crept, oblivious of where he was headed, or to who. Or why, really… This still felt like a tremendous waste of precious time- he had to get to Mercurial as fast as possible! If Silent Salt was approaching, then they needed all hands on deck.
…
Or… Maybe they still had time to retreat..? Maybe White Lily's message was something else and this could all be avoided? There was no reason to deny it at this point, this was a bad idea. With no soldiers here to look up to him, Silverbell could allow himself to admit his doubts.
Urgh! Why was he getting caught up with doubts now?!
But it was true. This whole plan… Saint Lily would never have condoned this. She wouldn't want the fairies to endanger themselves like this and much less to take down an enemy of hers. Her life was so stained with sin and regret, and she wouldn't risk doing something like sending innocent cookies for the slaughter…
The silver fae felt much sympathy for her plight. She wasn't just the one carrying the soul of Freedom and His Highness. She was a friend.
He knew she needed help. He wanted to help.
… He just wanted to help…
Whatever the message meant, it wasn't this, and Silverbell felt determined to do her bidding correctly. As a parting gift, in case they don't meet again…
“May she bloom…”
Mercurial was gonna crumble him… But it's not like he wasn't already dodging his orders by coming here in the first place.
Another hallway, at the bottom of the stairs. It was damp. Dough feels soggier in this subterranean, and steps feel heavier too. Rooms lining the corridor are blocked off with stones piled one on top of each other, but one more room, there's one room from where wind seemed to whistle through, and it was right at the end of the path.
Silverbell opened the door.
… There was someone here.
🍇–*.-Meanwhile-.*–🍇
The Beast of Deceit had invited Black Sapphire to join him after saving the child from starvation and near-certain death. He was a pathetic little outcast then, a scoundrel with no home that didn't kick him out as soon as he was taken in. A fine life, granted he didn't leave empty-handed. When approached with the proposition of living with a cookie dumb enough to save him, there was no way he could turn down the opportunity to live in the Spire! Any spire, really. Sounded rich. And that Cookie looked so regal, dressed in blues and golds and whites… Surely rich, it didn't take a genius to reason that much.
And speaking of genius… Wow! This blue cookie, he was smart, really smart! Some might say suspiciously smart, but Sapphire knew better than to prod too much for answers… There was a huge library in the Spire, one he was incentivised to take advantage of often. Shows were habitual, shows put on by the blue cookie and some obscure magic that the soon to be minion of Deceit had yet to recognize as the impressive, unmatched talent it was. He was learning so much. A mind like that is something you couldn't swindle, it turns out.
“Mr. Fount, sir?” The young purple cookie spoke up.
“YUCK! Oh, no, please! Enough of that name! Where did you even hear that?!” Shadow Milk spoke dramatically, as always, while Black Sapphire coyly held up an open book, signed by the Fount of Knowledge. “Ah. I see. Well let's get this straight- I am NOT that pathetic fool anymore, mhm!”
“You're not?”
“Of course not! You may refer to me as… Hmm.. Shadow Milk Cookie! Much growth has befallen me since I still paraaaaded around in those clunky cloaks! Yes, yes, I have grown… and soooon…” He circles his finger in the air, before tapping the young cookie's nose. “I'll grow you into a formidable cookie too.”
“Hehe… Well, good luck with that. My teachers tell me I'm as dense as raw dough… I can barely do math, and my sciences leave much to be desired…” He smiles, though it's clearly disingenuous. Shadow Milk pauses.
“... Aah, that so? Well that's a shame! That's not what I was looking for at all! I can't believe I got stuck with such a lame, dimwitted cookie!”
Sapphire turned his head away, facing the ground as he curled his knees up to his chest. He was sitting on the ground still, hesitant to take the big, puffy armchairs as his own. He frowned. Pouting. Like a little kid, which was all he was. Clearly not surprised by the reaction but nonetheless hurt, and disappointed. He hugged his legs in the discomfort of Shadow Milk's owl-like stare and judgement.
A vision of what was to come quickly scrolled by: Shadow Milk would try (and fail) to make him the scholar he was never destined to be. Then, he would be banished from yet another ‘home’, and it would be so fast he still wouldn't have started calling it a home, rather a house (or, well, a spire). A few villages away he would find more families to take him under their wing for a month and would eventually forget all about the weird wizard dude who lived in a tower in the woods with a huge library.
This vision never came true.
“Hm? Are you crying? Hey, hey, look at me, are you crying?” Shadow Milk said blankly, but in such utter neutrality it almost felt accusatory. Black Sapphire quickly swallowed his emotions and turned with a saccharine smile.
“Thanks for allowing me to stay here. I am forever grateful.” He said, tilting his head appreciatively.
Spoken like a true diplomat.
Such effortless… Such natural… Such beautiful lying.
Shadow Milk's face morphed slowly into a large, wolf-like grin, from ear to ear. He pierced through Black Sapphire's dough with his stare and creeped even closer to the purple cookie. He was over the moon.
“Ooooooh, I KNEW I made the right choice~” He announced, scooping the young cookie up from under his arms.
“Wha- Hey!”
“You and I… We're gonna change the world.”
He spoke, and so it was.
Many moons set on the continent of Beast Yeast, all of them spent training Black Sapphire in the art, the beauty, the study… of Deceit. So he wasn't a scholar. Who cares! Shadow Milk was scholar enough for the both. But not even he was quite as good as Sapphire when it came to one thing. That effortless charm. The showman attitude. The smile that hid all anger, sadness and disgust. It was… perfect.
The beast taught all he knew about theatre, and writing, and singing (he was terrible at this last one), all the arts that he could think of. He trained Sapphire in diplomacy too, but his main role was simple. An artist. An artist and spokesperson, who would televise the birth of the world of Deceit for the masses, dressed in impeccable suit and cravat, and who would entertain and sway emotions and thoughts, while Shadow Milk took care of the nasty bits.
A two-man show. The face and the mind, and a perfect plan.
Well, until Candy Apple showed up. She had her role too, but it was undeniable (and obvious) that there was a favourite. And it wasn't her. But hey! Extra minions were always a bonus for Shadow Milk. Especially one that was as dedicated as her.
In fact, it was only after Candy Apple arrived that Shadow Milk noticed something… Something which bugged him.
“... Black Sapphire Cookie?”
“Yes, Master?” The radio host answered, swivelling around on his chair. He was all grown up now. The years had turned him into the form he would retain for forever more: a strapping young man, with definition in all his features. A heartbreaker as some might call him. Eternal youth could be a curse, but he was vain enough to either not notice or not care. “Something I can assist you with?”
“Oh, it's nothing, really, it's just…”
“..?”
“Your sister… She's… quite a prodigy, is she not?”
Black Sapphire was a little taken aback, but he wouldn't be where he was without learning to bite his tongue. Sure, his sister was a pathological liar, but she had neither the wits nor the brawn to be considered anywhere close to Black Sapphire's level! The implication that she was, it was an attack on his ego and pride.
He wouldn't fall for provocation.
“She's quite gifted indeed.”
“Indeed, indeed! Being born from a lie, I would expect no less from her!” The purple cookie nodded politely. He removed the headphones from around his neck, ones he used while recording for his audio show, and then the plum sunglasses he inexplicably chose to wear inside. Fashion trends could be odd and fast-changing, but Sapphire never fell behind. “In fact! I've been thinking…”
Shadow Milk closed the door behind him gently, then tiptoed closer. When he was still far away from the radio host, he stretched himself next to the swivel chair to whisper in his minion's ear.
“What if I made her my right-hand cookie from now on? Hm? You wouldn't mind, would you?”
Black Sapphire minded, very much so. But he stilled his nerves. His sister had barely been working with them for a few decades. That was nothing in the grand scheme of things! Shadow Milk couldn't be serious, but if he was, playing his cards right was something the cunning underling knew how to do.
“If that is your wish, sir. But if I may ask, why the sudden change? Anything you feel is imperative I change about myself? I'm not averse to playing new parts, you know this well.”
“Oh, pfft, noooo, I wouldn't want to impose myself here, make you change and all that, you're fine just the way you are!” He uptilted the last sentence, then tapped Black Sapphire's nose, as he liked to do occasionally.
“Master, I am here to serve you, so it would be no problem if you–”
“WELL, if you insist.”
Suddenly, Sapphire felt himself get pushed down onto the chair and spun around quickly, so much so he didn't even think he was in the same room when he focused his eyes again and found an old timey projector casting a light glow on the wall. He hadn't used that thing in decades. Where did Shadow Milk even pull it out of? So fast too…
“My problem, dear minion, is that your lying… Well… How do I put this…”
“..?”
“You're an actor! Like any great liar is, and you are great! As they say, kudos! To your impressive resume!”
“I'm… Thanks?”
“But see, you lie very… socially. Very character-based… Candy Apple, oh, she's a hoot, she'll lie about anything, no questions asked, but you?” Shadow Milk frowned slightly, but somehow also exaggeratedly. Like he was forcing himself to appear less upset. “You have to be prompted much more often, and are much too cruel on the poor fools, gnats looking, wanting for Deceit~”
“You're saying I'm too… sincere?”
“Honest, straight-forward… If I dare say, too truthful at times?”
Oh no, Sapphire thought, already anticipating what might come next. Would he be made to plunge himself into the Milk Lake of Truth once more, like he did all those years ago when he was just getting initiated? Would he be tasked with some impossible feat like successfully lying to Shadow Milk to prove his skills?? Would his powers be stripped away? Or even his precious shows! Oh, the colour threatened to drain from his make-up covered face…
The Beast of Deceit was prone to unorthodox punishment too. There was no telling what he might have in mind until it had already happened, and sometimes not even then! The only constant is that whatever he had planned for Sapphire would surely end up in some trauma. Quickly repressed, and never addressed. Stuff that would mortify any other cookie, but that Black Sapphire quickly learned was to be seen as the virtue it most certainly wasn't. Someday, maybe, he could come to terms and recognize the wrongdoings that were being done to him. Shadow Milk, of course, preferred to keep his punishments for ones truly deserving of them, and only did this kind of thing as strictly necessary in his (admittedly very distorted) view.
But then again… Maybe that wasn't true.
Because the punishment that day, the corrective measure he took… went too far. It was too cruel. It was revealing the Truth to Black Sapphire.
All of it. Not an iota of reality left obscure.
The deconstructed, barebones essential of all that was basic and natural. The underlying machinations of the world that wasn't governed by the Witches they thought they knew, the ones with mountain-like hats and spoiled grins, but rather Witches from a plane above their own. Ones of absolute power. Ones of absolute might. 3 dimensional even.
I assume you needn't be told what I'm referring to?
It's you.
Black Sapphire resurfaced from the flash of information that had been projected in front of him, on the ugly wall, panting and sweating, the ticking of the tape beside him feeling like drums in his heart. He shook for weeks on end, curled up in the ground, tears streaming down his features, pooling in the recording room carpet. And he stood only after days on end had passed, his expression unreadable.
He made no comment. Uttered no thought.
His mind was elsewhere. Working to undo this mess. Working to forget.
And after months of this husk-like behaviour… He felt… better? A fog had been placed on the memory, obfuscating it for while he was alive, and that fog was made of Deceit. His brain had successfully rewired itself to work for Deceit. Every lie told was actively rewarding, and made him happier, for they made the fog denser. Centuries passed incrementally in seconds, and he could forget more and more, and more, and more…
He didn't even remember that conversation with Shadow Milk. Maybe it hadn't happened at all. Who knew?
That was the beautiful thing about lies… When you can't be sure of something, you might as well choose to believe what's best! If a memory causes pain, who's to say it happened anyway? Why hold on to the Truth and Knowledge of all that's happened to you… When Deceit would never hurt you like that?
…
Master Shadow Milk, you truly are a genius.
And so, he forgot. Almost, because of course no memory can truly just vanish forever, but for the most part, it was gone! And he held no grudges, there was no bad blood between them, Shadow Milk had taught him how to deal with those bad apples, those bad recollections that only serve to spoil the bunch. He had been taught how to live in the fog. How to thrive in it.
Theoretically, if he were to be in the same position again, he might recall some things. Like a lantern, it pierces the veil of mist. And sure, it might come back to bite him.
But what are the chances he ever finds himself in the same situation again?
He now stood at the bottom of the… space, again. Or, not the bottom. Maybe he just stopped going down. Why would this place even have a bottom? Or a top, or direction. Was it infinite? The cookie world was, so why not this one? And if this place was finite, then the cookie world must be too, right? But that… that's…
“No… All these thoughts, again… I, I've already- I've been through this before! I've had it, dammit! Shadow Milk, LET ME OUT!!” He screamed, in vain. “This isn't FAIR! I've done NOTHING, nothing besides being LOYAL and USEFUL! This is beneath me… This is beneath YOU!” Black Sapphire pointed above himself in absolute defiance.
He maintained that pose, even as tears started flowing and his hand started to shake. Then, his hand lowered. He looked at it then cradled his face with it, as if adorning his cold loneliness. Alone. Alone.
“I’m alone…” He whispered into his palm.
“We're alone.” A voice replied.
…
A voice?
A voice he needn't turn to identify, for it was a voice he knew all too well. The voice on all the speakers, coming from the face on all the televisions, coming from the cookie he feared and trusted, hated and loved the most.
He turned nevertheless.
“We are all alone.” He reiterated, staring face to face with himself. The purple visage he knew all too well, like in the world's clearest mirror, stared back, completely unblinking. Was it that it didn't know how to blink, or did it not know it should. Or was Black Sapphire the one not blinking. He reasoned it was all of it at once. He felt unnerved.
“... You aren't me.”
“You aren't more than me.”
“YOU'RE WRONG!”
His racing pulse raced faster and faster. The jam was running nowhere but his head, and it felt dizzying, it felt gross. Like throwing up on an empty stomach. Which was, all things considered, quite on brand.
The vision of himself was revolting. It was him exactly, but stiff, like a cardboard cutout. And Black Sapphire hated looking at it because of all it stood for. It was all he was and that shouldn't be! He couldn't see himself in the carbon copy from the uncanny valley, he could barely understand it when it spoke so mumbly.
It visited him in dreams. Narcissistic, perhaps, but truly, this copycat was the hardest thing to forget from the space in the code. It almost felt familiar at this point and that thought scared him the most. He was very used to himself, and was terrified of sharing the stage with anyone, even himself.
He turned again, with no reason to bother with this imposter, and walked straight. Somewhere away from this before he broke down. Maybe if he lasted here for just a little longer… Just a couple of moments, then… Then something in Shadow Milk may be sated, and he'll be satisfied with this torment, thus bringing it to a close.
Or maybe he wouldn't, but Sapphire walked, or floated in the form of walking, always forward. He couldn't stop shivering. He was muttering under his breath, trying to comfort his mind by telling it none of this was real. He almost believed himself, if not for the memories…
In this illusion of the Kaleidoscope, memories haunt any unlucky victim, possessing the very spirit. They mock your resolve by shining a spotlight on your weakness, whichever weakness that may be. It was a nifty thing, a power only recently acquired for applying in the war to come. Shadow Milk was already planning to subject Pure Vanilla to the odd torture, whenever they met.
It's your worst nightmare come to life.
…
He was still shaking.
…
He started running.
…
This wasn't real. None of it. It was an illusion based on a lie. It was Deceit incarnate.
…
And then it happened like magic, which it was.
Black Sapphire closed his eyes again.
Black Sapphire opened his eyes again.
He frowned in shock. He wasn't in that space anymore.
He opened his mouth to speak, but it was like trying to scream in a nightmare. Not being able to speak was scary enough for him, not being able to scream was mortifying. His voice was stuck, his vocal chords tangled, just like his disheveled hair. The purple cookie clasped his hands on his throat, and tried to cough and talk and scream and cry all at once.
…
Nothing.
But he did hear a voice. Behind him again.
“You'd rather see me smiling, huh?”
…
Trees. He looked dead ahead. Trees. This was a forest. And that voice was…
“Smile for the camera, haha…”
No. No, no, no, no, no, no, no.
‘This place isn't real’ he tried to think, ‘He isn't here’. And maybe he wasn't. But his presence was.
Silverbell. How he had failed his beloved fae that night. How he had let him run off, how he had let him fall victim to the beasts in the forest. And this, of course, must be karma. The one nightmare he had had in recent memory that wasn't the Truth, but rather his own mistakes. His own pride. His own… weakness.
He was still looking forward, like a fool.
“Black Sapphire?” The timid fae spoke behind him. It wasn't him. It wasn't, it couldn't be him. None of this was him.
…
Perverse. How he still wanted to look.
Sapphire stilled his nerves and prepared to revisit this moment. The torn wing. The jam-covered cracks in the dough. The pain. The pain.
… Now just look. Turn your head.
Slowly… Turning his head, as if rusty. In increments.
And he was expecting the memory as he knew it.
He didn't see that.
…
He saw a body.
“S… Silver–” He almost spoke finally, but had to close his mouth to not vomit.
He would vomit. The sight of a mangled body he struggled to identify as “Silverell's”. Wings that looked like cobwebs in every hole and tear. Lavender dough turned pink. Jam. Crumbs, crumbs piled one on another. If Sapphire squinted, every larger crumb pile began to resemble a limb. Crushed and forgotten. And vile.
It was a body, lifeless and still.
…
He vomited- expectedly so.
There was no light in those eyes, eyes that seemed to bulge out obscenely. There was a slack in the jaw. There were tears on his face, and his face had a bite taken out of it. His perfect, boyish expression. Ripped to shreds and crumbled.
The tree he rested on was the same as the one Black Sapphire remembered, and his brain almost forgot this wasn't real. Actually, “almost” is an exaggeration. He did forget. He just kept reminding himself.
And when those damn legs of his moved, they tripped on the roots, and Sapphire fell at the feet of his lover, the jam pooling around them both. It felt colder than it should. A chill ran through him.
“S… Ha…Sil- Silver–” Choking sounded out as he tried to summon the name of his beloved. The name of the body.
He reached out to touch him. He also felt cold, more than fairies usually are. He felt… abandoned.
… The image he was seeing. The moment he was experiencing. This would be what could have happened, if only they weren't so damn lucky. Luck was all that had saved Silverbell, not Black Sapphire. Sapphire had merely stumbled on him. Of course.
If he had words to speak, he would damn Shadow Milk for this. Curse him, threaten him. Whether the beast heard or not, it was irrelevant, but in fact, the jester was watching all this unfold, hidden away like a snake preying from the foliage. But its hiss was camouflaged too, and Black Sapphire couldn't hear how he laughed at all of it. Honestly, thank the Witches he couldn't speak. The minion would regret speaking up now.
“Silverbell… Silver… bell…” He sobbed to himself.
Disgustingly, he found himself struggling for genuine tears, which may have just been shock or a magical inconvenience, but he wanted so desperately to cry. He just… didn't. He paralyzed.
Black Sapphire's hand, sullied with jam now, came to grab the fae's pant leg, clinging to him for the little comfort one can find in a nightmare. The hug you give your fear before you wake up. He felt compelled to hug the corpse, for both their sakes, for whatever reason. And maybe a more rational person wouldn't. Oh well.
“I wouldn't… I won't let this happen to you. Never.” He said, Silverbell's head resting on his shoulder. “... I'm not letting you fight in a war you don't believe in. I'm not letting you–” The word ‘crumble’ didn't leave the show host's mouth. It wasn't typical of him to struggle with words. “Lovebug…”
When the tears were finally about to escape him, it was time.
It was time to wake up.
No magic lesser than Shadow Milk's could deactivate the Kaleidoscope, and only the Ancients really had that in the form of Pure Vanilla and White Lily. But luckily for Black Sapphire, he didn't need any help. All he needed was a bit of power from the Dark Side of the Moon.
“I'll see you on the other side…”
He reached into his coat's inside pockets and brandished it. A small, silver bell, with a wooden handle and small flower designs engraved on its bottom, that reflected moonlight like a mirror. It chimed faintly as he raised it into the air.
Once more, Black Sapphire took in the grotesque image of what laid across his chest. It was haunting, and would haunt him again in the future.
But his love was so close… It was almost possible to pretend this was already Silverbell, and smile. Not for the cameras. For himself.
Just like that…
Ding, ding, ding, ding!