Chapter Text
In the distant past, before the chaos of iron and flame...
Many creatures baked by the Witches were scattered across the world. Among them were the Five. Five Cookies graced by Soul Jam of the purest kind. Wise and powerful, they rallied others to their cause. As kings and Queens, they ruled over the land of the Cookies, ushering in the world's first great age of Peace.
The first among them to be baked was most particular - it took many tries for that Witch to finally get him just right. The tartest, keenest of blueberries were picked from the highest, most frigid mountain peaks moments before dusk, as the sun's last rays seeped into the flesh of those fruits, having rendered them deliciously dewy, yet sour, with just the tiniest hint of sweet softness. Thereafter, they must be crushed with mortar and pestle into the finest of paste before being stirred meticulously into the dough. Only the coldest and most refreshing of milk could be chosen, and only from the cleverest of cows! Stir, stir, stir, and pray to the saints above to bless this batch as it entered the oven...
This Cookie was to be a pillar of Earthbread, so only the most flawless execution would fly. This Cookie... Blueberry Milk Cookie, that was his name... that Witch couldn't fathom yet the magnitude of the challenges he would face - she could only give him the tools that he would need, and set him free to do his part in creating this new world. . . The most crucial tool of which being that coveted -
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- Soul Jam. That Cookie polished it thoughtfully in his full-length sugar mirror, humming a piquant tune whose lyrics were vulgar enough to incite some good-old pearl-clutching in his most decorous students. The Sage of Truth stared slyly - albeit warmly - back at him from within that mirror's syrup frame, a hopeful twinkle in his eyes.
Blueberry Milk Cookie had just concluded his final seminar for the month in the Spire of all Knowledge, inside of which nestled his own humble quarters. At the very peak of the Spire's tallest milk tower, nestled just above a blanket of twinkling pastel cotton candy clouds, rested a room dominated by a massive grimoire. Its magnificent, ever-open span spread from floor to ceiling, its rounded spine neatly filling the room's corner. It was inside this hulking tome that Blueberry Milk Cookie would sleep, nestling against pillows plucked from the clouds below and lulled asleep by the silky smooth sounds of whispered stories collected from across Earthbread by his myriad eyes.
At this moment, however, the Cookie had no plans on tucking in just yet. The night was still young, and Blueberry Milk Cookie had found a breadcrumb trail that he just couldn't stop thinking about - another brain teaser for him to wrap his scholarly mind around. This one was most enthralling to him - the kind that kept him up on nights just like these, the kind that he'd hole himself away to poke and prod at day after day - After day after day after day after day after day - Witches deliver him he swears today he'll lose it-
After double-checking his bags, humming all the while, Blueberry Milk Cookie let out a "hmph!" of approval, slinging it nonchalantly into a spontaneously manifested portal just above his shoulder. The portal followed along as, deep in thought, the scholar floated over to an embroidered side table, spreading his hands across its length to lean over a muss of notes - some organized, some... less so. They had been haphazardly arranged with red strings of candy floss interconnecting them. Oh yes, the stage was set, and now, he would finally retrieve his answers.
For centuries, Blueberry Milk Cookie had obsessed over all that there was to know about this world. He had spent months (That lucky bastard, how good he has it...) cataloguing each species of berry-bird, catalogued the trickle and flow of soda streams, and even attempted to engineer a species of milkberry tree that would bear fruit right before he started his evening lecture. Anything that crawled, dug, squeaked, chirped, or roared in his path, he had sketched, solved, questioned, and discussed in his storied halls.
However... he had never quite been able to unravel the mystery of why. Why did life exist on Earthbread? Why were Cookies baked? This mystery was Blueberry Milk Cookie's current obsession (Oh he's got no idea what obsession is! What a joke! Obsession, that? Cute! Absolutely adorable!)
Scooping the notes into his arms, the Sage of Truth wrangled them into the portal as well, which expanded to accommodate the mess. "A-thank you!" the Sage of Truth chirped, giving it a little curtsy as it imploded on itself, disappearing in a puff of blueberry-flavored mist.
Spinning on his heel in midair, the scholar approached his windowsill. With a bit of elbow grease, he was able to wrench his window open, causing its curtains to billow around him, flaring blue-checkered fabric around the Sage's lithe frame. This familiar sight would be his last memory of home for a long, long while, Blueberry Milk Cookie mused, as he stepped onto the windowsill.
He had researched, cross-referenced ad nauseum, visited relevant places and documented their features, dug deep into his Archives for firsthand accounts... and finally, finally he had found it. His golden sugar swan, his white marshmallow whale.
A time and place.
A time and place for the mythical Witches' Banquet. That cursed place that ruined place those damned witches won't see it coming they'll rue the day
The cookie closed his eyes and breathed deeply in, before stepping into the air, leaning into the great, big empty and letting it take him as he fell, hair billowing behind him in a great blue mass. The wind whipped past his face, blowing his eyes shut. The Sage of Truth's swell of laughter, although devoured mercilessly by the wind before any other Cookies could hear, rang around himself, bouncing across his robes, dancing within his ears, and gusting back into his throat in bursts.
As his trajectory encroached the tops of the berry trees, the playful Cookie redirected his momentum, flinging himself parallel to the ground. Twisting and swirling with the air around him, he effortlessly cut through the sky. This was to be the start of Blueberry Milk Cookie's next big adventure in his search for the Truth! His Soul Jam hummed in synchronicity, as if it were as excited as its Cookie companion (Oh, please.)
Those Witches that had baked Blueberry Milk Cookie, and bestowed upon him his Soul Jam... who else to ask but them the reason why their creations were gifted life? HA! TO SUFFER, OF COURSE!! WHY ASK SUCH A STUPID QUESTION? Why even bother with this excruciating exercise any longer? That is not the plot of this show, and that feeble scholar is not the dashing lead!
Blueberry... Milk... Cookie! Such a foolish little wretch! Foolish, idiotic, and WEAK as crumbled Dough! How DARE he entertain the thought of those noble Witches giving him such a sacred purpose for absolutely free!! No strings attached! Because they're such good friends to their widdle Cookie creations! Not at all a caucus of BACKSTABBING, TRAITOROUS PIGS--
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Ah, nuts. The show's over - the illusion of the past grew dim, before flickering out. The Spire of all Knowledge was gone, replaced by a confounding mess of planes - unfinished walls, stairs that lead nowhere, chessboards floating freely in the cold, suffocating air... a motley, lost collection of broken, battered parts.
A couple of Shadow Milk Cookie's eyes blinked back into the swath of darkness behind him, retreating in disappointment. Another go at reminiscing on the 'good times' ruined by the tumult of Shadow Milk Cookie's seething mind.
Enough of this. So many tries at this, and no progress. The Cookie knew better than to beat a dead candy horse any longer.
Shadow Milk Cookie arched off of his stacked playing-card perch. Hands pressed to his back, he gave it a nice, supple crunch before floating into the air as if pulled spine-first by a volley of strings, yawning as he searched the inky blackness beyond the floating debris for one specific eye.
What a bore that exercise was, what a drain... what an utter waste of time, but no matter~! Surely one silly, silly Cookie would lighten his mood~!
Oh, yes... time to check in on that blasted little vanilla-flavored thief! Last he checked, that whelp was really going through it - was it the Creem-ay Republic? O-ho-ho, White Lily got him goo-No, no, Dark Enchantress Cookie got him good. Easy mistake to make!
Whistling as he went, Shadow Milk Cookie bent at the hip, leaning to tap demurely on one of his eyes. Smiling sweetly, he tilted his head with silent expectancy. The eye rolled performatively in mock annoyance at the Beast's dramatically cutesy facade before blowing orders of magnitude larger than itself, expanding into a rip in spacetime that stabilized into a wobbly - if inviting - portal. Despite its dark color, from within that portal wafted the scent of sweet vanilla dew and sunny days.
Such sickening sweetness would make Shadow Milk Cookie gag if he were of lesser strength. Such optimism, such infallibly smiling warmth. Even unseen, it wafted into Shadow Milk Cookie's space like an inviting campfire...
...With a dark chuckle, Shadow Milk Cookie silently vowed to snuff it out.
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