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The field stretched out for miles, an ocean of soft petals swaying in the evening breeze. Wildflowers of every hue, saffron, lilac, rose, and deep cerulean, rippled like a living tapestry, catching the last rays of the sun as it lowered toward the horizon. The sky was a masterpiece in motion: streaks of gold melting into blush pink, then slipping gently into violet.
A warm hush settled over the world, the kind that made every small sound echo with meaning, the whisper of grass, the faint hum of insects settling in for the night, the distant call of a lone bird slicing through the stillness. The air tasted like honey and earth.
At the very center of the field stood a single figure, silhouetted against the flaming sky. He wasn't moving, just breathing, letting the light wrap around him like a final embrace before dusk claimed the world. Something was about to begin, though the field itself seemed to be holding its breath, waiting.
"Parrot!"
He heard a voice from afar, calling out to him, reaching out to him.
At first, he didn’t breathe. He couldn’t.
Because there, just a few steps ahead, half-hidden in the blur of late-afternoon light, stood the one person his heart had never stopped reaching for. Wifies. Time hadn’t softened the memory; it had sharpened it, carved it into something almost painful. The tilt of the head, the familiar silhouette, the way the breeze tugged at his clothes… it struck like a forgotten melody suddenly heard again.
His chest tightened, a slow, twisting ache that felt equal parts joy and devastation.
Every instinct screamed to run forward, to touch, to hold, to finally close that hollow space that had lived inside him for so long. His fingertips trembled with the ghost of long-remembered warmth.
But something was wrong.
The figure didn’t quite touch the ground. The light passed through his hair too easily, scattering like dust.
When he blinked, the edges of the figure quivered, as though made of mist instead of flesh.
Still, the longing was so fierce it burned. He took a step, whispering the name that had lived unspoken in his throat for months.
“Wifies…?”
The figure seemed to turn, almost tenderly, almost real. And for a heartbeat, the illusion was perfect enough to hurt.
Then the world shifted, a gust of wind, a change in the angle of light, and the figure flickered, like a candle fighting death.
His breath hitched. Reality crashed down with brutal gentleness.
It wasn’t Wifies. It had never been Wifies.
Just another hallucination shaped by memory, by grief, by the desperate ache of someone who had loved too deeply and lost too completely. The field was empty, utterly empty… yet the pain stayed. The yearning stayed. His heart still stretched toward the vanishing silhouette as if it could bring them back by sheer force of desire.
And when the illusion dissolved into nothing, the loneliness that followed was almost a physical blow.
Parrot crouched to the ground, holding himself from breaking down. Thinking about what ifs that only serve to worsen the situation. Parrot was smart, but not smart enough to escape the past. Not smart enough to fill the hollow space in his heart that Wifies left behind.
Wifies was his best friend, maybe even more if they had time. Time was something they never had enough of. If only they had time, maybe things would've been different.
He looks at the spyglass that he newly crafted some time ago for him and Theo. It's not the same. It's not the one Wifies gave him. It's not his prized possession.
That day, he lost two things he cared about the most.
That day, the disaster he caused. The disaster he can never turn back time on.
What if that day, he didn't get off the pressure plate? What if he listened to Wifies, did what he was told and obeyed? Wifies would've been alive, they would've been together and they would've had much more time together.
His head started to hurt, he felt nauseous. His wings hurt uncontrollably, he fully fell on the ground and looked up at the starry sky.
The sun had set, night sky clear and blue. The stars sparkling, unaware of the throb in his chest. What about his star? His star was gone. He killed his own star.
Parrot is smart, but not smart enough. He was completely lost. And he is the cause of that. He is a lost cause.
Parrot is a lost cause.