Work Text:
i wake up to the end of the beginning,
the stars above me bleeding gold fire
and the world crying out
in waves of crimson tides.
what has it all become?
i carry the cursed blade,
and steel skin that keeps
others out in more ways than one,
while the ichor of immortality
sets my blood on fire.
it is all within my grasp,
and yet so far.
"you are special"
but special means soldier.
war does not know the name of her soldiers.
she only knows their faces in death.
"your name will go down in history"
but who truly knows the core of achilles,
of heracles, of odysseus, of jason?
you know their names,
but you do not know them,
and what greater despair is there
to be remembered but forgotten?
what greater despair is there to
be known for the lives you have taken,
not the one you lived?
what greater fear is there to be known
by the blood on your hands
and not the blood in your veins?
"you are the son of the sea"
she is not my mother.
my mother is mortal,
and brave and beautiful and
all the things i fear i cannot be.
will my ichor burn away my blood?
will gold overcome red?
will i become my father,
cruel and everchanging
and unknowable?
or can i change the path
that the fates have woven for me?
i was told i was a hero,
a fighter, a child of destiny.
but i am so much more.
i am human, and that
is what makes me good.
i wake up to the beginning of the end,
the stars bleeding out in worship,
and the world holding her breath.
The End greets me like an old friend; and isn't she?
how many times have i seen her on the battlefield?
she smiles at me: "let go"
i rise the sword.
i shake my head.
not today.