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Whole doesn’t leave Soul when it kills him. Even as it’s tearing him apart, even as the back of its tongue drags against a cold cavity buried under a wreath of shadows, it knows. It knows that this is what he wanted, that if he had a mouth he’d be smiling up at it.
He doesn’t leave because Soul’s teeth have climbed the spiral staircase of their skull to sit atop their head. He doesn’t leave because his arms hang heavy from their spine, and encircle them when they feel a chill that shivering can’t flush out.
Mind is relieved that Soul took his life. Soul knows that he never would’ve done it himself, no matter how much he growled and snapped and bared his teeth. He probably could have, if he truly wanted to. Whole was a God to them, but all Gods are created, and the ones who wrote the scripture could easily burn it.
But Mind wouldn’t do it. He wouldn’t look at that part of Soul and rip its throat out, leaving it drowning in its own blood. That’s why he’ll never be the true Ruler. He’s too willing to put his fate in Soul’s hands.
Heart doesn’t seem much changed, at first. Soul watches them often, peeling new eyelids apart to stare at them through Mind’s. Soul thinks they might be speaking more, but they can’t remember how often they spoke before no matter how hard it tries. It just remembers their flesh coming off in strings and their eyes popping out with a squelch.
It listens to them now. Whatever they were before, some creature pulled out of the dirt or buried by hands scrubbed raw, it looks at the person they made themself and tries not to feel ill.
Soul remembers watching those two from far above, tied to a broken throne. They were so distant that it couldn’t even make out the contours of their faces, the colors of their eyes, the way they kept their hair. Now they watch in much the same way, but every detail is apparent to them. Whole’s eyes, Soul’s eyes, it doesn’t matter- they’re seeing and feeling and it is better than ever before.
Better than nonexistence, maybe. Even better than that time when none of them can remember themselves, where some thoughtless human stumbled and crawled and curled in on himself and still had a self to call his own.
It isn’t lonely, not exactly. Soul wouldn’t call this loneliness, nor would they be right to. But sometimes they watch Heart’s blood gush over his legs and don’t move to help. Sometimes Mind breaks his fingers on the kitchen tile and they don’t reach out with a flickering hand and weave their wires together.
They’re tired, but not how they were before. They aren’t tired of living anymore, they’re tired of not. They’re tired of the way Mind’s clock stutters when it sees the shadow that spills over their cheek. They’re tired of Heart waiting for them to slip back into old habits and seeming perfectly content to allow it to happen.
They aren’t used to this. Every step they took before was made with the intent of bringing them closer to a rooftop. Every word that fell from their mouth was meant as a personal eulogy.
So they’re grateful that Whole hasn’t left them. It knows that doesn’t mean anything- one can hardly leave himself, no matter how hard Soul tried. Still, when it feels the shadow stretch over its body like a second skin, it feels reassured that he doesn’t blame it. That he wouldn’t want it to regret its choice.
It remembers how Whole felt when it killed him. He didn’t feel betrayed- that was all Soul, all its own guilt and love and cloying shame. Whole was elated. Whole was relieved. There isn’t another memory in Soul’s skull that feels so pure and genuine in its happiness. The pride of a teacher watching his student do as he was taught envelops it when it remembers.
Soul flays the shadow from themself, sometimes. Never in view of Mind or Heart. They would be repulsed by them, and then they would be repulsed by themself. Soul allows themself to hide from that feeling.
It comes off easily, despite how hard-won it was. It falls to the floor like a discarded coat, then recreates itself in Soul’s absence, building up the idea of a person with practiced ease.
It isn’t Whole. It looks like him- looks like the thing that said it was him. It blinks at Soul with many-colored eyes and hovers just barely too close for comfort. If it was him, three or four hands would be guiding Soul into a better position, showing them the ‘right’ way to do things in the hope that they’d get it wrong.
They guide it, now. They use the unsightly bony phalanges of their wings to manipulate the illusion like a mannequin, pulling one of its hands to their cheek and the other to their waist.
“Is this what you wanted him to do?” It asks in Soul’s voice, and they let go of its appendages and let them wander. “Did you want him to mean it when he was gentle?”
The curtains are drawn, leaving them in the pooling darkness that Whole seemed to find comfort in.
“It doesn’t matter if he meant it,” Soul says deliberately, careful not to betray any emotion to its better self. “All that matters is that I did.”
“You figured it out,” the shadow says, with no way to know whether it did, in fact, figure it out. “Good.”
“Good?” they breathe out. “Not me. Not like this.” Soul grips the shadow’s hair, made up of wispy tendrils that wander in the air as though it’s underwater. They tug its head back so that its nape rests against their pulse point. Then they lean close and press a kiss to the space where its lips would be, were it not taken up by a watery eye.
Chapped skin collides with the soft bottom of an eyelid and the spongy surface of an eyeball. It hurts when Soul’s teeth collide with the organ, and it feels it. It feels like someone driving a trepan through their skull and perforating their brain just deep enough to keep them alive. They do it again, and again, and again, until their temples are throbbing and they can’t help but double over and dry heave. Their ears are ringing, loud and grating, and there’s nothing in their stomach but blood and bile.
The shadow that is all that remains of Whole rubs their back through it, and when they’re done choking, it slides up its arm and returns to its rightful place.