Work Text:
When I gave you that blessing, it was meant to protect you.
At first, Solazar couldn’t believe it as he held his son’s hoodie in his hands, staring blankly at the fabric worn down by time. He didn’t believe Agoti was really dead. Agoti pulled tricks and pranks on him all the time, this time.. this time, it wouldn’t be any different.
And yet he heard the heartwrenching cries of his son’s best friend as he doubled over onto his knees, heaving sobs into the red hoodie that contrasted the grayscale environment around them.
They had managed to get into the Void, but they were too late.
Agoti was erased.
—
..It was meant to protect you .
Solazar dragged himself to the couch that was too empty. He glanced over to the vacant space where the screen demon would have been sitting, where he would have been cackling over whatever video they were watching on the TV. A pang of pain twisted in his chest as he recoiled into the cushions, gripping the hoodie with shaking hands.
It’s a bit damp..
He sighed, peering at the tear stains from Tabi’s fit of anguish. Suddenly, he felt selfish for having felt loss— and yet, he felt.. insufficient.
When he learned that Agoti had died, he only denied it in his head. When he saw Tabi’s small body crouched over what remained of the demon, he denied that as well. He felt more impressed at how far it had gone instead of feeling sadness for his son.
Yet here he was, holding his hoodie in his hands.
I can’t believe it.
His brows furrowed as he pulled the hoodie close to himself, sitting completely still as he reminisced over what he could have done. His eyes began to sting as tears pooled in the white spaces, threatening to spill down his face as scenarios played out in his head. He could’ve done something, anything to prevent his son’s death.
..But could he really?
Solazar sighed deeply, retracting into himself on the couch and closed his eyes- but then they immediately opened again as something poked into his chest from inside of the hoodie.
Pulling the piece of clothing away from him, the flame being reached into the inside of it, wrapping his fingers around something rectangular within the fabric. At first he was confused at the discovery of the item, but as he pulled it out of the confines of the hoodie, his heart stopped.
A VHS tape.
..No.
No, it’s not..
He didn’t want to look at the label, narrowing his eyes at the tape as his hands trembled from how hard he had been gripping it. He winced a pained breath, slowly moving his fingers to peer at the transcription on the tape, face contorting into guilt as he read over the messy scribbles that resembled writing.
My Final Song.
God, how corny..
He clicked his tongue at the label, chuckling weakly to himself at how like Agoti it was to have a..
..a message like that.
His facial expression fell flat, actively trying to hold back the pain that swirled in his very being. It was like Agoti, and this would belong to nobody but him. Nobody but him.. nobody would leave a parting message, except for..
“ ..Shit. ” He hissed, slamming a fist into the armrest of the couch. “ Why couldn’t I have.. ”
He was angry, angry at himself for not having done anything. He never got to have any meaningful moments with his son before he was banished. One whole year of worrying, one whole year of trying to keep himself together..
It was all for naught. Who knows if Agoti was already dead throughout the entire year? Had they just gone about their days, blissfully unaware of his death, or had they really been too late? How late? A couple days? A couple minutes? A couple seconds ?
An ache wrapped around the head that he held in his hands, tuning out the room around him as his thoughts swam in his head. Without thinking, he got up and shuffled over to the TV, inserting the VHS tape into the player and fell back onto the couch. He had almost forgotten about his action if it hadn’t been for the crackles of static that came from the TV. Solazar sat up, propping himself up weakly on the armrest as the memories of Agoti’s mind quite literally played out in front of him.
Until then, Solazar had never known the loneliness that his own son had felt until he saw it in front of his eyes. Solazar hadn’t found Agoti immediately after he was born, and now he knew how confused and desolate the screen demon felt as fragments of his creation flickered on the screen. It seemed that these moments had been shortened to a bearable length as only a few seconds had passed until Solazar saw himself on the screen.
He spent the next hour staring into the TV as pieces of Agoti’s life pieced together like a string of events from his first steps, the moment he ate that console, the burns he got from Solazar’s fiery being, and his discovery of video games, to his make-do education, his interest in hobbies, his first friends, to his bonding with Tabi, the moments he had spent dancing and messing around with Kapi, his encounters with Nikusa..
He paused the video player as he sat on the floor in front of the screen, breaking out in a cold and hopeless sweat as he gripped the VHS player. He knew what was coming next, and he didn’t want to see it. He knew he had the power to stop the video there, to get up and take the hoodie and pretend it left off at those happy memories.. and those not so happy ones. What mattered was that they were the memories of a living person, if he could just pretend..
Solazar shook his head at the thought, huffing as he held the hoodie close to him and pressed play again.
It was agonizing. He felt the same loneliness he had felt when he first played the tape. Just like the beginning, Agoti had been completely and utterly alone at the end. Solazar felt drained from how much he had cried and sobbed at every second on the tape— he had thought he had no more tears left to cry, but they spilled out of his eyes anyways. It burned.
He couldn’t watch as Agoti remained motionless for such a long time, but he was still alive. Solazar could hear little wheezes and friction against the rock beneath the demon, and he felt pain every time. Somehow, these very moments felt longer than the entire tape.. he could only imagine how it felt for Agoti.
At some point, Agoti didn’t even breathe.. but he was still alive. He hadn’t gone hungry or thirsty or tired, he could only exhaust himself as he desperately clawed at the earth in a futile attempt to escape the uncaring dimension. His son was a fighter, but he.. No, he couldn’t say he wasn’t strong enough. The Void had just been a prison, just as its namesake suggested.
Solazar couldn’t tell whether he was glad or guilty every time he peeked at the screen. Sometimes it was the same blank sitting, sometimes Agoti had tried to entertain himself by singing. At times he had boredly played with the floating rocky platforms, jumping from surface to surface or destroying small chunks of them.
And, at some points, he had begun to hallucinate, blindly indulging in the pastimes he used to partake in back in the real world. He talked to himself often, thinking that he was talking to Tabi or Kapi, or even Solazar. It hurt the father the most, seeing that his son was lost in his own delusions as a method of temporary happiness before he came to, the bliss melting away instantly as he returned to the cold void. He hugged the near-soaked hoodie at these visions, closing his sore and burning eyes as he slumped over where he sat, burying his face in the fabric as he began to slip into unconsciousness..
“ Dad.. ”
“ ..What? ” Solazar jolted up immediately, feeling hope in his heart at his son’s voice. He knew he was alive, he just knew—
“ ..I feel like shit. ”
Of course, it had come from the TV.
“ I don’t wanna be here anymore. This place sucks ass, not even 5-star.. hehe.. ”
“ ..I miss you. I miss you and Tabi and Kapi and— and hell, even Nikusa, that supersized bitch. I miss everyone. I don’t wanna be alone anymore. ”
“I-I miss you too, Agoti. Please.. ” He scooted closer to the TV, placing his forehead against the screen as if he had been trying to comfort his son.
“ I feel so ffffucking alone all the time, I’m.. I don’t know why this had to happen to /me/. I didn’t even do anything personally to those pieces of shit, I just— God.. fucking damnit! ”
“ ..I know, Agoti. ”
“ Even these fuckin’ illusions aren’t enough. I want to see you and everyone else again. I.. ”
“ .. . ”
“ ..I’m sorry if I wasn’t a good enough kid for you, dad. ”
It became harder and harder to breathe as his throat closed up from the sobs that built in his chest. “ No— no.. Agoti.. y-you were the best son— that I could’ve.. ”
“ I’m so sorry.. ” Agoti’s voice shook as he fell to the ground, rolling over onto his side and bringing his knees to his chest in a weak hug.
“ ..I love you all, really, I mean it. ”
The visuals on the TV began to flicker, fading darker, darker, yet darker until it had dwindled into nothing.
“ No, no.. No! Come back.. Please, I.. I love you too, Agoti, you.. ”
Solazar wailed as he slid to the floor, gripping the VHS player with trembling hands as he hyperventilated into the hoodie.
I was meant to protect you.
—
“I’m so sorry. ”