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Once upon a time, there was a soldier far too young for his accomplishments. He won wars with idols once cherished; won the independence of a country thrice-destroyed; lived through isolation with a tyrant once-human.
He died at 16.
You don't remember his life, much. You don't think you want to.
He'd been called a child a lot. By his brother, both teasing and demeaning. By his best friend, light-hearted and weightless. By the whole server.
The soldier was 16. His best friend is 18, now.
The soldier was 16.
You don't remember much.
You grieve, you think. Sometimes. For your inability to move on. For the grief you cause others. You've never seen the soldier's best friend without the red kerchief on his neck.
You think the soldier may have been someone worth cherishing. You've never seen so much as a scuff on a single monument of his. Yours.
You frown.
His. The soldier's.
His.
You don't like looking at yourself.
You wish your form was different, was warm. Wish you'd died by lava instead of by the hands of your─ his abus─ the soldier's murderer. It would've been cool, you think. Maybe you'd have eyes pouring molten rock instead of bruises and cuts and scars that'll never have the chance to heal.
Maybe you'd be warm.
(They were friends.)
(They were friends, the soldier and his─ his murderer. Real friends. Not, not like they were in Logstedshire. Before the countries, before their discs, before their war. They were friends.
You don't miss it. You don't, you don't, you don't. You barely remember it. But─ but─
You wish. You wish, you wish, you wish.)
The soldier's best friend talks to you, sometimes. He tries to get you to remember. If you say the right things, his eyes gain a feverish spark that could almost pass for fiery. It looks good on him, that light. Better than the heart-wrenching emptiness you usually see.
Most of the time, he just apologizes.
He does not come to you, those times. You happen upon him, at your─ at, at the soldier's grave. He'll smile and conceal sobs and clutch the red kerchief always, always on him, and he'll thank you.
And then he'll apologize. A lot.
If the soldier were still here, you think he would've known what to do. But you are not him, so you stand and you smile back and caress the green bandana always, always on your neck.
You thank him, too.
He'll cry harder, and you'll mutter an apology, as well.
Your best friend's husband leaves an allium at the soldier's grave every week.
He talks to you a lot.
Your best friend's husband seeks you out. Your best friend's husband is nice. He tells you about flowers: their meanings and the best ways to grow them; and he says he learns all of it from a book the soldier owned.
That makes sense, actually. You already know all the things he tells you about flowers. You don't want to ruin his fun, though, so you let him talk to his heart's content.
You tell him, with all the warmth you can muster, that he has a big heart.
He tells you the soldier did, too.
Your memories don't run from you, exactly. Not like Ghostbur's. They're...
They're the opposite.
They're there, right on the edge of your mind. You can feel them, all of them, scattered about like a dandelion's remains.
You don't reach out to grab any.
The soldier was loved.
That's what everything built in his name tells you. That's what your best friend and his husband tells you.
You...
You should listen to them, really. They're not─ they're not the ones who couldn't even remember their own name. They knew him, the soldier. They would know if they loved him or not.
But you were him, weren't you? And─ and─
You─
You think you grieve, sometimes. For him.
The soldier loved. He loved, and you think he might've been loved, once upon a time, and he─
He wanted to live.
He wanted.. he wanted to heal.
He was ready. He was trying, he was trying, he was trying, he was ready.
He never got the chance.
You grieve. He's dead, and so you grieve.
The soldier crawled out of Logstedshire of his own volition. The soldier left even when there was no one around to help him realize he should've. He lived. He went through hell and back again. He lived. He escaped, he won, he was ready.
He's dead.
He had another brother.
No one told you, no one told you, but he visits, one day, and you don't quite remember him, but you recognize him. Your memories are weird like that.
You call him your brother. He looks at you weird and states, very firmly, that you weren't. And you are not the soldier, but you rear back anyways. Tears trail slowly down your face, but your not-brother looks like his life is flashing before his eyes, so you laugh wetly.
The expression is familiar, you think. Maybe he made it whenever he made soldier cry.
You are reminded, with disorienting clarity, that the soldier is dead. You cry harder. The soldier's maybe-brother's face twists, and he reaches out to you. You laugh and wail and wish you were alive.
He was the soldier's brother. You knew he was. No one told you he existed, but he does. He's your brother. He's from the nether. He's warm and gruff and your brother. He always has been. He always will be.
You think, maybe, that the soldier never got the chance to tell him that.
He visits a lot, now. No one told him you existed, either, and you think maybe he wants to make up for lost time. It's a nice thought. It makes you feel warm, so you never ask for the real reason.
Sometimes, he looks at you with a certain expression you think even the soldier might have struggled to make out. You don't recognize it. He hides it whenever he realizes you've seen.
He's your brother.
He yells and pokes fun and ruffles your hair so vigorously you topple over. He isn't like the soldier's best friend, who speaks to you so softly it feels like he's speaking at you instead. He isn't like Ghostbur, who's like you but not, but not, because he doesn't have a choice and he thinks you don't either and you are lying to him so you avoid him at all costs. He isn't like everyone else, who look at you with grief sewn in their faces and yell or speak or cry at you like you're the soldier and you're not, you aren't.
You aren't.
You tell the soldier's brother, one day, while you two are out picking flowers, that you're not his brother, not really, because the soldier is dead, and he can never come back, and you are not him.
And he looks at you.
You still don't understand his expression, but it's familiar in the exact same way he was.
He tells you, steadily, that he's still your brother anyways. That he always will be.
You don't cry. You try very hard not to cry. But something in the far edges of your mind reminds you that the soldier never got the chance to hear that, and it's a very close thing.
You walk, today. You usually zip about; it reminds you of gentle eyes and a laugh you might've heard a lot and a welcoming green that isn't the soldier's murderer or your best friend.
Today, you walk.
You walk through grass you wish you could feel, past memorials you wish you could appreciate, with a grotesquely bruised form you wish were different.
The soldier lived a heavy life.
There is.. a lot of words you could use to describe him. He was stupid, you think. Naïve and hopeful and stupid.
You could call him selfish. You could laugh at his death. At how he begged his abuser to stop, knowing it wouldn't change a single thing. At how he went into that prison mustering up a cautious hope that you wish had been beaten out of him.
You could be cruel.
You don't want to be.
He was a lot of things, when he was alive. A friend. An enemy. A brother. He wore scars like a mark of pride; wove people and fabric together with jerky movements and a confident demeanour alike; comforted with brash words and soft eyes; challenged with a sharp grin and calloused hands.
Gave, and gave, and took.
The soldier was a lot of things.
You think, in his final moments, he was just a kid.