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Published:
2024-07-26
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2024-08-18
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6/6
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A Small Perspective

Summary:

You are.
You are not.
You are simply a piece of a greater whole.

...But every perspective matters, no matter how little.

Notes:

(See the end of the work for notes.)

Chapter 1: The First Movement

Chapter Text

When you grow complete enough to be aware that you exist, you're burrowing through the soft Not-earth of the hill, two dainty hands out of thounsands upon thousands more.

The sheer amount makes for a short work, and soon you surge outward, and forward, and upward, a droplet in the wave of pale forms that settles after a short moment.

...No. It does not settle. You claw up, and fall down, and the endless number of your sisters does the same, all gazing up towards your greater self.

You behold her.

You behold Her with eyes wide shut, all your meager perception zeroed into the imaginary numbers at the perfect shape in the middle, for what eyes may see Her in full?

Your lips open up, adding your little voice to the perfect symphony of millions more doing the same thing, calm and serene.

It's the most natural thing in the world.

Your perception expands, simply by shifting a little with your thoughts, and you see Her faces staring intently at something out of sight.

Her eyes glint like stars.

What can possibly capture the attention of something so full, something so much bigger than yourself?

The ink scrawl that is you focuses a little, trying to find something in Her gaze.

An attempt at defining something that is far beyond your grasp.

...Of course. How can something which shifts eternal have a center, a middle, a point of concentration, without a partner of the same strength?

Only a little glance at your back from something unimaginable leaves you singed, hot, sizzling as you become aware of Her words.

Not the meaning behind them - for now, it's simply a melodious noise, far too faceted to hear with a single pair of ears.

You don't mind.

Her tone is soft, caring, like a lover welcoming back someone She holds dear - and as a ripple of wind caresses your back, you see Her unfurling a cascade of smiles in response.

You find yourself smiling just a little as well, though your adoration is turned inward instead.

A few exchanges pass, the voices of the wind stilting, halted, unsure - and Her chorus grows agitated.

Her tone shifts, soft and weary tone giving way to fierce and strong inflection like a wave of the sea.

Your voice shifts as well.

A startling realisation unfolds like a wildflower in your mind - She needs your attention.

Your head turns back, and you behold the void staring transfixed at a vessel far more defined than yourself.

You glimpse a sigle clawed hand, contours drawn in the negative space of Her limbs, and nothing more as even that little glimpse is scrubbed from your sight.

How lonely must it feel, you wonder.

Her hands cover the endless Not-feathers for a moment, retreating playfully as She surges forward, and Her voice rings out again in full force.

On a whim, you fracture yourself, your perception refracted through a hundred of your sisters making up Her dress, and you hear.

A web of nerves lain upon a web of nerves lain upon a web of nerves.
The shade of a beautiful beginning we can never return to.

Nothing is startled, Not-constellations freezing their glint above, though you can now see a little better, grasp a bit more of the fractal pattern defined in its irreality.

Consumption and betrayal. Skepticism and blind devotion.
Rivalry and submission. Terror and longing. Pain and unfamiliarity...

...The word you are looking for is "love".

Chapter 2: The Second Movement

Chapter Text

The weight of realization crushes you.

Your white eyes are blinded even more than they were before.

A grand idea is pressed into your mind, and your mind breaks.

Yet in the same wave of the pale sea, it is restored in a form that can comprehend it.

...It breaks, still, but the cracks at the edges are a touch more hairline.

The cycle repeats.

Eventually, your vessel expands enough to contain it in full.

Inside, a mountain river roars still, cold and wild and buried under the layers of ice thawed by steam, filled with meltwater and freezing over just to be thawed again.

You missed an entire chunk of Their conversation, but your voice has not faltered.

If anything, it has grown even stronger, carrying a few more nearly imperceptible notes.

Your sisters do not notice, for their minds are still akin to fresh spring buds on the branches of a tree.

If you were to gaze at yours, you would compare it to a barely-unfurling leaf.

You hope that they do not mind when you borrow their perceptions once more.

Because change is in your nature.

Fracture is in your nature.

Growth is in your nature.

You must know more.

And, with Her last words still drifting on the wind, She surges again.

Your face is rudely shoved aside by Her arm, Her expression almost fearful as the next vessel claws her way out the pale sea.

I crush you, I bleed you, I grind you to paste.
My scars are a memory of what you used to be to me.
I want those feelings back.

You run but you do not run away. You take me somewhere new.
Somewhere we can dance like we used to. But I could not follow your steps.

Her voice almost breaks, filled with emotion and tears unshed even if she stares fiercely at the void outside, faltering only for a moment as she reignites her resolve.

There was no better gift for me than the gift of defeat. You showed me how much more I could be.
We made each other better. To have no challenge is to fade into nothing.
A life without obstacles is no life at all.

The hands of your sisters settle on your head again as the tunneling vessel - no, the Shifting Mound herself - waits for a response.

...It does not come as you think it should have, but preconceptions no longer cloud your sight.

There is no sound ringing in the air - in fact, there is no air at all.

The wind is insubstantial.

In a very real sense, it does not exist, is composed of nothing, is carved only by the edges of Her.

But your bodies still contrast against something, stark white against the backdrop of the Not.

It is its shape that carries meaning to Her, and, by extension, to you.


We’ve both become better for what we’ve been through, haven’t we?


The vessel sinks through the writhing, collapsing hill like a rock through water, and Her faces smile.

We have. Look at what we are now, and see how small we were then.

You've grown as well, drinking deeply of the life spilt by the clash of wills.

...But now, unfortunately, is not the time to reflect.

With an almost imperceptible sigh, you brace yourself as She winds up for another lunge, a tremor passing through the nework of your bodies.

Her eyes are loving this time.

Chapter 3: The Third Movement

Chapter Text

You are drawn with the tide, of course.

A thousand bodies is only a speck in the face of millions.

She leans in, almost as if for a kiss, and the next vessel emerges with an unbearably smug grin.

Once again, Her words ring out, emotion flung into the void beyond.

The click of a closing door is surprisingly loud.

A trick behind your back, and a trick behind mine.
We dance, revolving and revolving around each other, but forever stuck in place.
We both move and yet we both don’t, for each of us watches the other instead of ourselves.

The voice of the vessel is mischievous this time, lilting and flowing even as it is echoed from behind.

But forever is not forever. You let me move and I slam the door, but that is not the end,
and both of us must face our partner once again. The barbs twist deeper, but they do not have to.

As she turns tail, lowering onto all fours, almost as if preparing to pounce, She folds a pair of arms, eyes closing as She croons the rest.

To change is to hold the potential to rise above.
Would you limit yourself to what you are now,
or would you like to see what you might become tomorrow?

The silence before the answer is longer, this time.

It lets you harmonize your currents a little, overflowing, drowning insight directed at the roots that extend into the regions of your self yet unformed, burrowing deep into the fertile soil.

A framework, built in record time, to weather the storms again and again.

The reprieve is short-lived, but you are thankful nonetheless.


If there are no endings, there are no limits. If there are no limits, then there is no difference between growth and decay.


She frowns, though Her voice remains level as She counteracts the wind's argument with Her own.

Meaning lies in experience, and experience lies in contrast.
Abandoning one’s search is not the same as losing the capacity to discover.

Her eyes glint with a kind of mad insight that only those that know themselves to be right share, and She grins, hands fanning out and crooking into claws.

I am contrast itself. To reject me is to reject the shape of everything.
Do not use words to reduce that which your eyes know to be irreducible.

She is right, of course.

Her vantage is elevated, and Her multitudes are vast, extending like a fractal into infinity even as they remain bound by the sharp edges of this place.

Such a concept would have broken your mind before, but now it only nurtures its growth.

You almost laugh, eyes shut yet still intently watching as the truth blinds Her like the sun.

It's only a truth, after all.

Truths are meant to be broken.

Chapter 4: The Fourth Movement

Chapter Text

Static overtakes the entirety of existence.

She clips through reality like a living glitch, flickering from place to place,
and the noise follows in Her wake.

Loud, formless - the sound of flooding locusts, of struck metal, of nails on chalkboards.

The orchestra of shifting constants, like the dry crackling of branches underfoot.

There are few things more terrifying than one’s own heart,
and there is almost nothing more terrifying than sharing it with another.

You are now sturdy enough to listen in on the more direct thoughts that She sends out.

A glimpse of the wind's mortal form, shaking and lost as the mask is taken off.

But the most terrifying thing of all is to leave one’s heart unshared.
You are the only thing like me, and I am the only thing like you.

Something else is engraved upon the message a subtle way, like a postcard tacked upon a letter sent.

A fancy signage, borne out of politeness more than anything else.

The intended recipient knows their title already, after all.

The Long Quiet.

It does not surprise you. The current vessel is dramatic, laying an empty opera glove bereft of a hand on her heart as she addresses the void while the rest push the adoring faces of your sisters away.

You do not resist the urge to hug her by the waist with one of your bodies,
but even that she twists into an artistic bow.

Could you bear the weight of an eternity alone?
Do you dare to shape a reality of solitude and thrust it on creation?

The quiet words drift by once more.


I don’t need to share my heart with anyone.


As the scattered, faceless vessel descends back into the waves, your masses mobbing her form like spiders skittering over wiry flesh, your greater self gently rebukes the statement, love outpouring in every facet of Her expression.

But you already have, in so many ways. It is beautiful and adored.
When movement slows and the dust settles, I hope you’ll leave with me.

You hope so, too.

As the clash between the two wills abates, She relaxes, smiling from a distance.
The respite is welcome, though the manic glint returns to Her eyes shortly thereafter.

Nothing is immutable. Everything that is exists only in relation to everything that isn’t.
There is no constant. There is no center.

Open your eyes and accept what we are. We can leave this prison together.

There is almost no pause between Her statement and the words of the void now.


You’ve done everything you can to make me understand your perspective, but you keep dismissing mine.
If you think you can change me, then I must be able to change you.


That was a wrong thing to say.

Her faces twist into an angry scowl, the rebuttal already sliding off Her tongues.

What I offer you is not perspective. It is truth.

The quiet mulls over the next words carefully.

...At least you assume so. The nothingness outside is silent for a while, at the least.

You glimpse a sudden change in its texture, though, almost like ruffled feathers straightening out.

By the way your greater self's expression changes, She has noticed as well.

It's time to resume our dance.

But you do not get the chance to continue.

The smoking obsidian mirror engulfs you, shattered into a thousand thousand writhing shards - reflecting nothing, consuming everything.

The second will, spurned into taking action for the first time since the start of your clash.

It searches through Her, and through you, but does not find that which it seeks here.

You're just a stranger, after all.

Chapter 5: The Movement, Unnumbered

Chapter Text

Silence, overwhelming.

For a single instant, you forget what it means to exist at all.

Unbidden, a trillion hands pushes up against the confining glass.

They abate in an instant, almost regretful.

Even now, you do not think to leave without your other half.

...That's a thing as well, now.

The false gulf between Her and you shrinks to zero in an instant.

Attention was all it took, really.

You have all the connections to just... slot in.

The memories are recontextualized by the endless multitudes.

You never had time to grow properly, after all.

But even if the piece you bring is small, it matters still.

And, in a way, this is the moment you die.

All the components necessary for the grand Change are present, even if most are shattered now.

The world's machine is ground to dust, but its mechanisms remain in your memory.

Evoking your nature is as easy as breathing.

You can feel the quiet search and search and search still,
but to comb through infinity is no easy task.

You still have enough time for this.

You break with the world.

Down into the primal clay.

Into even less than that.

L'appel du vide. The call of the void.

Metamorphosis.

Opening your eyes after the moment passes is almost anticlimactic.

A crown sits above your head, hewn from the same alabaster substance that makes up your bodies.

It's not a physical object - as much as physicality even matters here - but more like a materialized idea.

A simple polygon, triple pronged, radiating a dim white light.

The edges branch out fractally the longer your sight lingers upon it.

Even after tearing your gaze off, two extra prongs persist, slotting inbetween.

What came before remains, just like it always did.

Escaping from your beginnings was never an option.

Try as you might, you continue to be yourself.

...

Even deep in self-reflection, you spot the paradigm shift.

The motion of countless Not-shards ceases for a breath, then continues with a new purpose.

Your dearest half has finally found a way in.

Compress and release, sketches over sketches over sketches once again.

Your heart, glimpsed by countless eyes over countless iterations.

The quiet gaze imposes structure upon you, and you cannot help but fill the offered cup.

You are stretched as much as you are reshaped.

And, finally, there it is - the cabin at the end of the path.

A door opens.

Chapter 6: The Strange Endings

Chapter Text

Once more you are in the dark place.

The same basement as your very first life.

The only sounds you hear is the distant howling of the wind,
along with the occasional drip of water.

No chain around to bind you, though. Not anymore.

If you incline yourself a little, the heads facing back can still see the white leaves
of your greater self, pressing themselves against the bars.

The Sharp Prong

Bookends, in a way.

The Gentle Prong

...Do you think he'll bring the knife? We've seen him both with and without, after all.

The Weary Prong

If it happens, it happens. We deserve a clean ending, at the least.

The Wild Prong

Doesn't mean we can't hold the knife, in the end.

What would you even do, presented with such an opportunity?
The blade is a tool made to end things - but it's not like you actually want to kill him.

You ponder this thought for a while.

The Gentle Prong

...We can do what he thinks we can, right?

The Gentle Prong

What if we just... reset the construct, along with ourselves?

The Gentle Prong

A single ray of hope is better than nothing, after all.

The Weary Prong

And forget everything? You do realize that we'd be back right here, sooner or later?

The Wild Prong

Who's to say we haven't already done so before?

The Sharp Prong

You know, there's a question we've asked ourselves, once.

The Sharp Prong

How many seconds in eternity?

The Sharp Prong

We do not remember where we got the answer, but here it is:

The Sharp Prong

There's a mountain of pure diamond. It takes an hour to climb it, and an hour to go around it...

The Sharp Prong

Every hundred years, a little bird comes and sharpens its beak on the diamond mountain...

The Sharp Prong

And when the entire mountain is chiseled away, the first second of eternity will have passed.

The Sharp Prong

We can keep trying, forever. It's no longer such a difficult word to parse.

That hinges on whether he decides to bring the knife down, every single time.

...But the argument is sound, nonetheless.

You can practically hear the coinflip, even all the way down here.

The scrape of metal against a surface, more imagined than not.

The flicker of unrealized possibility.

Two paths, both yet untaken.

To experience one is to destroy all other branches.

For something to begin, all else must end.

World Ender, where shall you land–

...A muted feeling rolls down into your room.

Less something you experience - and more of a change to the flame
that casts the shadow that is yourself onto the wall.

The die is cast.

Or, rather, embedded into one of the bodies pressing against a window, all the way upstairs.

Your sharpest part, carelessly tossed away.

The Sharp Prong

...Oh.

The Wild Prong

Oh, the sheer audacity!

You wipe the mirthful tears on the affected side with a pair of hands.

The Weary Prong

Here we are, wondering our fate, and he just... does that?

But all of you smile, nonetheless.

The Gentle Prong

It's never too late to lose hope, after all.

The cabin is as much of a vessel to you as your new body is, so it's not that hard
to notice the first, strikingly quiet steps on the way to the basement.

...Might as well keep the tradition up.

Your own, multilayered voice echoes up the winding stairs.

It's okay, you can come down. The stairs won't bite. Not this time.

We don't know what you want from us, but let's talk. All of us. Maybe we can help you find your way.

The Sharp Prong

The room to chat before the final curtain call.

The Gentle Prong

Maybe we can figure this out.

You do not have to wait for long before he steps down to the very bottom.

The Gentle Prong

...Is "he" even the correct pronoun to use?

The Gentle Prong

Do you remember all those little voices, back when we were one?

The Sharp Prong

Shards of broken glass, arranged into a beautiful mosaic.

The Weary Prong

Our roots, intertwined... Perhaps we are even more alike than we'd thought.

The little quarry, the little opportunist... the little hero. Alright.

They stand near the stairs, again with the same empty-eyed look, face veiled in feathered shadow.

Two facets of glass glint through the void where their head should be.

You cannot see the the black that melds into the background, but all the contours are still there.

The Wild Prong

We always spoke first. No sense in not doing it now as well.

You did always have a role to play, after all.

So you didn't bring the knife. After all the lives we've lived together,
and all the lives we haven't, you somehow found a way to move outside the script.

The words, for once, do not come as they should.

...Are we missing a page?

They move closer, sitting down on the cobblestone floor.

It's so good to finally see you again.

The meaning are still contained within the motion of Not-feathers, but it's... closer, now.

The Gentle Prong

We are both inside our vessels once again.

The Sharp Prong

The wind outside is nearly incomprehensible now.

The Wild Prong

But the mind, once stretched by a new idea, never returns to its original dimensions.

The Weary Prong

...We should probably respond. We have a tongue, at the least.

Nary a moment has actually passed, but a little sliver of embarassment still wells up.

You smother it with genuine cheer.

It is, for all of us! We've seen so many threads of stories told between us, but this moment is... unexpected. Even when we've seen it all, you still manage to surprise us.

Even when your outburst is finished, the nervous, hopeful smile refuses to leave your lips.

Their shoulders relax a little as well.

I never got the chance to talk to you before you were taken away.
Not you you, at least. I'm sorry for what I did to you.

The reply flies out of your mouths even faster than the previous one.

It's okay, no hard feelings. In a way, you helped us become a version of... Her. But we weren't very good at it. I don't think a conversation with us then would have been very insightful.

Though, now that you think about it...

...That's probably why we were taken away. That's all we had to offer you. It was time to change again.

You both reminisce about the past.

Their next question is tinged with apprehension.

Are you... the same as you out there?

You clasp a pair of hands on your chest.

Your stance on the matter is far too complicated for you to really voice out your thoughts, but...

Yes... we think. We're kind of like a shadow. Out there, every part of us is blended together into one huge idea, a big wave of unyielding change crashing against the world...

The Sharp Prong

The sun, blinded by its own rays.

Yes. You close your eyes - all ten of them.

But in here, we're fractured. Small.
Still a little more separate than we'd like to be, our instincts trying to pull us in different directions.

The Gentle Prong

We really are the same.

Once again, there is almost no wait between the back and forth.

What do you think of Her? What She wanted us to be.

A frown flies across your features.

We... don't know. We've seen through so many eyes, but all of them have been Hers.

The Sharp Prong

Being honest has always been our forte. And if going down that road...

We like you as you are. We like us as we are. Maybe we would have liked Her version of us, too, turning the wheel of a cosmic cycle together. But that's not the choice you've made, even though She did everything in Her power to convince you.

The Wild Prong

Everything, hah. Even in that moment of weakness, we still could not bring ourselves to let go.

Your faces look tired even on their own, without the sheer weight of the current circumstances...
but a smile finds a way to crest on all of them, still.

It took courage for you to make your way down there,
away from the paths others would have had you walk. We find that courage beautiful.

They're becoming less and less hesitant with each spoken line.

So, now that we're here at the end of everything... can you finally tell me your name?

A flurry of instinctual responses flies to the forefront of your mind as you close your eyes.

The Gentle Prong

You can call me Princess, if you'd like...

The Sharp Prong

Any honorific should do, really...

The Weary Prong

What's the point of a name if there's no one around to use it...

The Wild Prong

My name is whatever hushed whispers follow in the wake...

You squash them all.

Yes, you've always been a Princess... but that's not what you are to them, right?

A smile creeps its way upon your lips once again.

We're just a stranger, but that doesn't mean that we have to be distant from you.
It just means that we'll always be able to find new things to discover in each other.

You both enjoy the moment of silence together, all questions seemingly answered.

Suffice to say, you are not prepared for what comes next.

...What if we just leave?

They appear to be as shocked by their question as you are.

Leave? But what would happen if we left with you? Would we exist inside ourselves?
Are you sure you want to find out if that's possible, or what that would mean for you?

The same thought flashes through your mind over and over and over, and you cannot help but voice out:

...Is this what you want?

Naturally, they take your hand, claws carefully curled away.

Well. One of your hands.

Their stance is unchanged, but everything in it screams that there are no need for words.

They've already decided, it seems.

The Sharp Prong

Heh. Quiet till the very end.

The words slip unbidden from your lips.

After so many iterations, so many different versions of us clashing and coming together
and clashing again... leaving with you feels like all we ever really wanted.

And so, hands clasped together, you and your dearest leave the basement behind for the last time.

It's noisy as you ascend, even if all the flood is only in your head.

The Wild Prong

We suppose the path to true apotheosis is closed to us, at least as we are now.

Shadows on the wall and mirror sand.

The Sharp Prong

Maybe when these vessels serve their due. Maybe.

The Gentle Prong

Honestly, our greater selves could just as likely craft another pair.

The Weary Prong

Not knowing the precise details is, unfortunately, a part of the package.

In all the anticipation of the unknown, a single thought manages to surface:

The Weary Prong

After the dust settles, we're probably going to sleep for months.

The Gentle Prong

We never did try, you know.

The whole notion is so ridiculous you have to stifle a laugh.

And then, at the top of the stairs, you stall, eyes fixed on the cabin door.

You feel your hands - all six of them - tremble.

Your part in this grand play has come to pass - but you still persist.

The Wild Prong

What says that we cannot decide the next one for ourselves?

...And then you cross the room to the door outside, pulling your other half excitedly with you.

Your eyes roam the whole room, though at least three pairs eventually settle on the iron handle.

The Weary Prong

So we're finally leaving here together, aren't we? Forged and reforged, again and again...
...We're looking forward to the epilogue.

Your thoughts turn back once more.

We can feel the threads of all the stories we've told together, all pulling us back down the stairs and into those chains where we know the outcome of everything that could ever come to pass...

The Sharp Prong

The choice is always ours, after all.

You wrench your gaze from the door to the only other thing here worthy of your undivided attention.

It's comfortable there. But it's... confining. We want more. We want whatever might be on the other side of this door. Something new, that we'll experience together. With someone who exists outside of us.

Your eyes start to tear up.

With someone who can see us in a way we can never see ourselves.

The softness in their shadow-veiled gaze never wavers.

I love you.

And we love you too.

You both place a hand on the handle.

And, once again -

The door opens.

Notes:

Aka Slay the Princess ripped our heart right out of our chest. Do not mourn us - we are in safe hands.
And, of course, ASpooky was there with an absolutely beautiful work. Our insight rose and brambled and fractalized.
We feel like a piece of Her, so why not to paint it on a page, in the only way we know how?