Work Text:
"We couldn't do it." Miriam hopped off her broom and plopped down on the ground next to Kiwi, dangling her legs off the edge of the cliff into the empty abyss. "That's...that's it. Just like that, it's over."
Kiwi looked uneasy, turning to stare into the black hole that had opened up in the sky. It was so bright. Everything was so, so bright and so, so quiet. Miriam's voice seemed to carry for miles. Maybe it did. Maybe the world was ending and it was their fault and the whole world would get to hear all about it in its dying moments. The end was silent, but it refused to grant them peace.
"I hate this," Kiwi admitted. When Miriam cocked her head, they gestured vaguely at the sky. "All of this. The way it happened. The way...we did everything right, but…"
"Maybe Audrey was right. Maybe this was really meant to be how it was. Maybe there was never anything we could do." Miriam closed her eyes and tipped her head back. "Maybe we were stupid for even trying."
Kiwi groaned quietly, hugging their knees close to their chest and burying their face in their arms.
Miriam looked over and saw the nauseous frown on Kiwi's face and elbowed their ribs lightly. "If I had to be an idiot and fail to save the world, I'm…" she swallowed, "...'m glad I got to be an idiot and fail to save the world with you."
"Heck of a team we make, huh?" Kiwi said, smiling a little bit. "I'm glad I got to know you. Even if it was just for a little while." They crossed their legs and sat up a little.
"Yeah. It was good little while."
They were both silent for a moment, looking up at what remained of the sky.
"Maybe this is silly, but…I wish we'd gotten to hear the Earthsong. Just once, before everything…" Kiwi's voice trailed off. "I don't know. Just to feel like we actually did something."
Miriam kicked her legs a little, hitting the side of the cliff with her heels. "I mean, you learne most of it, right? That's not nothing. There's not exactly a lot of people who can say the same." She socked their arm with a smile. "Don't be so hard on yourself, you big dork. That's my job."
"Yeah."
After another moment's pause, basking in the silence of it all, Miriam stood up and offered her hand to Kiwi. "Come on. If everything's gonna end, we can at least do better than sitting on some lame cliff talking about how sad we are. I think that old bell is somewhere around here."
Kiwi took her hand and dusted their pants off once they'd been helped shakily to their feet. "The one we woke up the Dream King with?"
"Same one, I think. Probably not a lot of huge bells hanging around anymore." She waved a hand at the ruins around them. "Let's go see it. Maybe ring it one last time for our old buddy's sake."
Kiwi smiled at that and, still holding onto Miriam's hand, sprinted off to start climbing up towards what remained of the Dream King's castle. Miriam yelped as she was dragged along but caught up quickly enough.
After such a long adventure, neither could be sure where they found the energy to scale the jagged remains of what once was home, but they found it nonetheless. It wasn't long before they'd woven their way up the rocks and stood beneath the familiar bell – cracked up the side, but still otherwise in one piece.
"It's weird. Seeing it like this, I mean," Miriam breathed. "All...ruined and stuff. It was kinda beautiful before."
Kiwi said nothing, just leaned against a nearby column and hummed. Their eyes were closed in something between contentment and concentration.
It wasn't long before Miriam realized she recognized the tune – or part of it. Kiwi swayed a little bit in place as they patched together a melody from bits and pieces of the songs they'd learned to call on the Overseers – the running harmonies they'd sung alongside Miriam's piccolo to enter the Sun- and Moonscape, the odd jumps between notes in Queen Chaos's song, the toe-tapping rhythms of the Orderscape's tune – all with little improvisations between tying them together seemingly effortlessly.
But then, that was just Kiwi. Making everything look so easy. Even when the planet was disintegrating around them.
And then the flowing melody paused, took a breath, and settled on one note drawn out for several seconds. Then another note, higher, more hopeful. Then back to the first.
It wasn't until she saw shadows moving around her that Miriam thought to look up – just in time for the bell to strike for the first time.
In the dead silence of the world, it was deafening. Miriam wouldn't be shocked if the people of Chaandesh and Rulle could hear it from here. Or Chismest. Or…
Kiwi was rising to their feet now, building back into a song that seemed to burst from their lungs of its own accord, possessing them entirely. They continued to sway in place, the wind swirling around them and playing impossibly low notes as it blew through the cracks in the ruined walls. They sang skyward and could almost swear they heard the faraway ghost of an accordion somewhere.
Their song morphed slowly into a familiar shanty, repeating a few times as it led Kiwi in a joyful, tipsy-looking dance around the little room beneath the bell. They spun and spun in place, a feeling of ease in every one of their movements. Miriam couldn't have torn her eyes away even if she'd wanted to. It was hypnotic.
And then, all at once, the free, easygoing melody was shattered with a stomp of Kiwi's boot on the ground. A harsh, droning song filled the air now, sorrow and anger and fear all balled up into a few long notes as the tune became something like a tap dance, held together by Kiwi's feet stamping on the ground in perfectly-timed indignance.
Something swelled inside Kiwi then, full to bursting with some kind of feeling they couldn't quite put a name to. Their voice continued on, feet stomping and hands clapping alongside it, and with every strike of boot against the ground, the whole world seemed to shake beneath them.
Miriam found her foot tapping in time with Kiwi's, too.
And then they were jumping around, leaping nearly across the room as a ballad erupted from them, something that demanded a duet and Miriam wasn't sure why but she felt her mouth open and the notes came pouring from her unrestrained, for the first time in her life without fear of what anyone might say. She twisted her body and threw her hands up in the air and felt like maybe she wouldn't care if the whole world were watching her on this makeshift stage right now. And she wasn't sure what to make of that, but Kiwi was looking at her and grinning now, still locked in their reverie but almost terrifyingly present at the same time.
The song continued and dissolved into one long note that rose and rose, a howl at the tops of their lungs, and everything in the world seemed to slow to a stop except for the wind, which raged around them and had them both clinging to themselves.
And then, a lullaby.
Kiwi did not know the Dream King's piece of the Earthsong. Kiwi did not know much about the Dream King at all. But they sang the world to sleep in his honor, a thanks for all he'd done in spite of everything he had become at the end of his life.
The winds slowed at last then, every note ringing through the air – somehow louder than the clanging of the bell – defying the silence that threatened them.
And just like that, the melody ended. A few final notes faded into softness, and Kiwi dropped to sit on the ground below the bell, the its ringing resonating through their ribcage.
Miriam wanted to say something. Felt like she should. Thought about "That was beautiful," "That was incredible," "Earth couldn't ask for a better send-off."
Thought about anything to stave off the unbearable silence that had already settled back in around them between every toll of the bell.
Kiwi was crying. It took both of them a minute to realize it, but tears were streaked down Kiwi's cheeks. Miriam couldn't recall seeing them tear up, but she must have seen it, because she hadn't taken her eyes off of them once since they'd started.
She rushed to sit next to them, to wipe their tears dry. They were smiling all the same.
"I heard it," they said simply, and suddenly the silence wasn't so unbearable anymore.
The bell rang again.
Had the grass there always been so green?
"Everyone…" Kiwi began, but Miriam shushed them.
"You really worked yourself half to death on that song, huh? Take it easy for a bit."
She looked around the room, unsure what to do next. How did you pass the time at the death of the universe, anyway? What are the appropriate activities?
Hang on, didn't the bell have a huge, kind-of-impossible-to-miss crack in it before?
And wasn't it, like...not...bright, shiny, new-looking gold?
"Oh my gosh…"
Both of them whipped around to look behind them, where Eyala floated timidly.
"I am so so so so so so so SO proud of you two!"
Miriam barely had time to help Kiwi back to their feet again before they leapt up into the air gleefully. Disbelief melted into unabashed joy in a second split so thin you could barely see it at all.
"WE DID IT!!!" Their chest heaved with excitement. Miriam was worried they just might hyperventilate. "RIGHT??? Did we do it?"
Eyala barely had time to finish nodding before Kiwi added anxiously, "I thought it was over!"
A kind of coy smile crossed the face of Eya's messenger, the closest thing to sincerity she'd shown since Kiwi had met her. "I thought so too…"