Chapter Text
The slick, marbled stairs of the forever-climbing Spire were cold on Pure Vanilla’s feet. Colder, perhaps, than the dough-deep dread flowing through him as he ascended the treacherous tower. He tried to reason with himself: was it truly wrong to trespass, if all he sought was knowledge? He had always walked that path, and prided himself on resisting the prophesied deceit that had long since consumed the source of his borrowed, copied power. He needed to see him. He meant no harm.
And did it count if he wasn’t truly a stranger?
A sharp wince escaped Pure Vanilla as he felt the unwelcome sensation of a shard of glass slicing the dough of his bare foot, a thin thread of strawberry jam already tainting the marble a sickly red. Stumbling back, he identified the source of the glass: a shattered mirror on the wall, its cracks exploding outward from a single violent impact. His mismatched eyes, creamy gold and sky blue, widened as they met another pair in the fractured glass. Cerulean and teal, tear-stained, peculiarly familiar. But before he could reach out, they slipped away in the blink of an eye, leaving Pure Vanilla with his own shattered reflection once more.
As he continued to climb, he felt that dreadful feeling in his gut spike. It was a feeling that was unnatural for the altruistic healer; Pure Vanilla usually wouldn't feel so sick and guilty for such important matters, nor was it the kind of intensity he was used to. Each echoing step he took seemed to intensify the trepidation, the fear, the anger that didn’t quite feel his.
"Is… anyone here?" He called out despite himself, the only reply being the harrowing wind that flowed through the cracked, colored windows and the faint, nearly inaudible giggle that sailed with the breeze and lashed at his golden hair as he climbed. He paused by a mosaic, cracked and broken over time, that painted beautiful imagery of the virtue he had inherited. A prophet, a poet, a genius, as some may say, now only seen in this dark tower as a menace to be feared and hated.
A pity, how things become so dreary.
The next landing came sooner than expected, though the Spire had no end in sight. The walls, this high, no longer gleamed and shone like the walls of the Vanilla Palace; they grew dark and dirty, slick and glistening with acidic condensation from eons past. Pure Vanilla found a slight ledge, one that may have been a ruined bench, and he took a seat to catch his short breath — and to inspect his still-sliced foot, which, thankfully, had healed over from his subconscious magic.
He had to admit, despite its deteriorating state, the Spire’s architecture was rather admirable. It was tall, deceptively so, with endless, cantilevered stairs well-lit by hanging lanterns dripping from beneath them, paired with the tinted sunlight flowing through the cracked windows. Every couple of hundred stairs or so — he had lost count — there was a hallway filled with room after room split by paintings and candles. And, overwhelmingly so, Pure Vanilla couldn't help but notice the amount of blue. Blue wallpapers embellished with card suits, blue flames on candelabras, blue carpets, blue books by blue trinkets, blue eyes-
Someone had a favorite color.
Pure Vanilla was jolted out of his musings by a shriek around the bend of a twisting hallway, a few stairs up, followed by a shushing. He darted up the stairs, ignoring the rush of dizziness that danced around his vision as he arrived at the entrance of the hallway.
"You always make such a fuss, you brat...!" A low voice hissed, emanating from inside a room further down the hall. Pure Vanilla strained to hear the debate as he attempted to pinpoint the location from which the voices originated.
"I’m not making a fuss!" A higher-pitched voice, almost ear-bleedingly so, retorted.
"Yes, you… arrgh! Let go of my wing!" The lower voice, formerly silky smooth, now had a harsh edge of anger. Pure Vanilla located the door, cracking it just enough to peer into the argument.
Inside a living quarter, two Cookies stood facing each other. The taller one, dressed in purple and black, caught Pure Vanilla's attention first. He had fluffy black hair that spiked in every direction, and wore purple gemstone earrings with pupils, matching a choker around his neck. His charming outfit featured a silky shirt with card suit symbols on the lantern sleeves, complemented by tall heels that gave him a height advantage over his rival. Ah, speaking of…
Tugging the taller Cookie's bat wing was a younger, shorter version with white hair featuring a grayish-pink stripe styled in pigtails tied with black bows. She wore a bowtie, wrist bows, and bows on her buckle shoes. Her outfit included a puffy white shirt, a red pinstripe vest, and a voluminous red skirt layered with black and white stripes. One leg had black and white striped leggings, while the other was bare. Like the taller Cookie, she also had bat wings at her hips, but hers were accented with red rather than purple.
"I’m not letting go~" She teased, tugging on the wing once more, "Not until you tell Master about your little secret…!" Secret? Pure Vanilla saw the fiery rage building up in the taller Cookie’s eyes.
"Hey," He growled, "do not go up there-"
"Or what?" She snickered. "Scared of him finding out about your little boyfriend?"
"-Hey-"
"I’m gonna go tell Master that you’ve been sneaking off to the Faerie Kingdom without him knowing!"
Ah. Siblings, Pure Vanilla mused. The younger Cookie began to take off, the taller one catching her by the back of her vest as his choker’s eye flicked towards the door. "Up, up, up, you rascal. You are not, under any circumstances, going up to Master right now." He clung to the back of her shirt, grip iron-strong. It’s not like she was truly fighting back.
"Yeah, what are you gonna do about it? Who’s really stopping me?" Her tone took on a false sweetness, one that the older Cookie saw right through, earring eyes trained on the door alongside the gemstone on his neck.
"Candy Apple," His voice had a sharp edge as he stared her down, lifting her with ease. "You know how Master is right now. You know what will happen to you if you bother him. And besides," his eyes met Pure Vanilla’s, "We have an audience."
Pure Vanilla swiftly shut the door as soon as he realized he had been spotted, stumbling backwards. How did that Cookie even see him? He was sure the two had been engrossed in their argument, but now that they knew there was an intruder in the Spire, Pure Vanilla would certainly be hunted down and sent off to who-knows-where in Beast-Yeast. Reasoning was useless; he was sure of it. So, he did the only thing he could think of to get away.
He ran.
The edges of his vision blurred as he darted from the door, away from the stairs, and down the endless hallway. The walls seemed to close in on him — perhaps they were, who knows how this twisted spire functioned anyhow. Each step echoed in the air, mingling the smell of wax with hints of sweetness and decay and the ugly smell of rot. He didn’t dare look back, a panic rising in him as his limbs moved against his will. His eyes were tearing up. Why? His limbs shook, and a pang of unlocatable guilt flooded his chest as he came to a halt. Pain exploded behind his eyes as the sting of tears he didn't own streamed down his face. Behind him, the patter of closing footsteps was engulfed by the earth-shattering ringing that sounded through his skull, making his head throb and his throat close with consternation.
"Stop," the only word he could slip out to the empty ears of the blue around him, "stop, stop…"
No, no, no.
His knees hit the floor, then his hands. He was done for. Debilitated, he’d be caught and would never find the knowledge he sought.
And all he could do in the torment was… think.
Stop… what, exactly? Pure Vanilla had felt this sort of pain, the tears and movements and emotions he didn't own — never to this degree, of course, but if there was one thing he learned, it was that it didn’t stop. Not even when he walked it off, or when he meditated, when he gardened, or when he slept. But now it was shattering his world; piercing through his mind and quaking his body.
He didn’t know how long it had been until the ringing stopped, a sickening silence stealing the breath from him. A void was left in his chest, an empty feeling that he didn't know he could feel until the agony dissipated. Pure Vanilla gasped, fingers twitching against the Spire’s icy floor. The alien emotions, all of the tears, the ringing, the rage, they vanished as abruptly as they’d seized him. All that remained was the hollow ache of their absence, a splinter gouged from his dough.
"Hey, you. This yours?"
A gloved hand thrust into his vision, clutching Pure Vanilla's pointed hat. The shining gold accents reflected his face — no, not his — for a flicker, before the image shifted again into his own wide-eyed stare.
Pure Vanilla recoiled.
Above him loomed the taller bat-winged Cookie, his smirk sharp as the throb in Pure Vanilla's chest. The gemstones on his ears pulsed faintly, their pupil-like slits tracking his every flinch. Beside him, Candy Apple crouched like a feral cat, her grin all teeth.
"Wowww, he’s super out of it," she sing-songed, poking Pure Vanilla’s shoulder. “What's the matter? You look like you've just seen a ghost!”
The taller Cookie swatted her away. "Don’t taunt the trespasser, Candy Apple. He’s clearly defective." His voice dripped mock-concern as he lifted the hat to eye level, inspecting it. "Though… you are interesting. Most Cookies don’t scream on our floors unless we make them."
Pure Vanilla’s throat burned. "I didn’t-"
"Liar~!" Candy Apple chirped. "We heard you! ‘Stop, stop, waaaaah!’” She mimed fake sobbing, then plopped onto his back, her weight startlingly heavy for her size. "So! What’s your deal? Spy? Thief? Assassin?"
The taller Cookie rolled his eyes, lifting Candy Apple by the collar with his free hand. She did not like that. "He’s obviously here for him. Just look at those guilty eyes." He leaned down, dropping Candy Apple without a care, his choker’s gemstone glowing as it locked onto Pure Vanilla’s face. "…Though I do wonder why you’re crying his tears."
“What?” Pure Vanilla rasped out. “Who’s tears? …Who are you anyway…?” He shakily rose to his feet, not bothering to take his hat back from the taller Cookie, who he now realized was about eye level with him. Just as Candy Apple was about to speak, the other Cookie shoved her aside, bowing dramatically with a glint in his eye.
“Ah! I cannot believe I failed to introduce myself,” he stood tall once more. “I am Black Sapphire Cookie-” a fitting name, Pure Vanilla supposed, “-host, writer, reporter, and entertainer. Allow me to say-”
“Hey, dough-brain!” Candy Apple screeched, shoving Black Sapphire away. “He doesn’t care about your titles! Ahem… I’m Candy Apple Cookie, Master’s favorite-”
“Master?” Pure Vanilla’s eyebrows furrowed. He had heard the pair refer to this ‘Master’, but now that they appeared to be allowing him some semblance of answers, he might as well question what was going on here. “Who is ‘Master’?”
“Ehehehehe! Ohh, you silly little Cookie~! You must mean Shadow Milk Coo-” Candy Apple’s enthusiastic response was cut off by Black Sapphire covering her mouth with an awkward chuckle.
All the pieces clicked into place.
The obsessive blue saturating every corner of this tower. The virtue he'd inherited; the prophet who'd fallen to its shadow. That glimpse of cerulean and teal in the broken glass, vanishing before he could reach. The way his chest had split open with someone else's anguish, tears streaming down his face for pain that wasn't his to carry.
Shadow Milk Cookie.
The realization crashed over Pure Vanilla like a wave of ice water, stealing the breath from his lungs.
He's here. He's actually here.
Not just somewhere in this tower, not hidden away in some forgotten corner. No, he was the Master. The one these siblings served, the one Black Sapphire seemed to desperately not disturb. Shadow Milk Cookie wasn't a memory locked in the Spire's archives. He wasn’t countless paragraphs that prophets from long ago gifted the pages of the blue-covered books that covered the shelves of this decaying tower. He was living here, breathing the same air that filled these halls.
Pure Vanilla's knees threatened to buckle, but he forced himself to remain standing. After all this time, the sleepless nights, the unexplained tears, the emotions that weren't his own… he'd found him.
Black Sapphire's gemstone earrings pulsed, tracking the shift in Pure Vanilla's expression with unnerving precision. Candy Apple tilted her head, her grin faltering as Black Sapphire's hand dropped from her mouth.
"Shadow Milk Cookie?" Pure Vanilla's voice came out steadier than he felt. He met Black Sapphire's gaze, then Candy Apple's. "That's... that's who I'm looking for." He swallowed hard, fighting the urge to tug at his robes. "Would you… Tell me where he is?"
The pair glanced at each other. Black Sapphire stood tall, his jaw set.
“...Candy Apple… misspoke.” He spoke slowly, his eyes on Pure Vanilla’s while his jewelry glared at Candy Apple. “There is no… ‘Shadow Milk Cookie’ here. He died years ago with the other Old Virtues, as everycookie knows.”
“Well, ah,” Pure Vanilla straightened as well, playing along. “Perhaps you could… show me to your Master, regardless? I understand this is the Spire of Knowledge, and I come for just that: knowledge. It’s… well, my speciality,” he chuckled, “given that I-”
“Who do you think you are anyway?!” Candy Apple abruptly stepped into Pure Vanilla’s personal space, her high-pitched voice irritating both him and her brother. “You’ve been asking all the questions here, and we don’t even know your name!”
“Ah- well, I- you never inquired as to-”
“Candy Apple-” Black Sapphire barked- “would you just-”
“NO!” She screeched. Ouch.
Taking on some of Black Sapphire’s defensiveness, she leaned closer to the taller Cookie conspiringly. “Shh… just trust me, Sapphy, I have a plan.” She hissed.
Pure Vanilla did not indicate that he could hear her clearly.
The pair whispered to each other for another moment before Candy Apple stepped forward, ignoring Black Sapphire’s protests. “Sooo,” she drawled, “how about this: you give us your name, aaand we’ll bring you to our Master! I promise~” She giggled, winking rather obviously at Black Sapphire, who was now pinching the bridge of his nose.
“Ah… very well then.” Pure Vanilla nodded. He swallowed. “My name is Pure Vanilla Cookie.”
All the color drained from both of their doughs.
“Did I… say something wrong?”
“P… Pure Vanilla Cookie.” Black Sapphire stammered, looking at the hat he still held with shaking hands. “You mean. The Virtue of Knowledge, Pure Vanilla Cookie…?”
“...Yes, that’s me.” Pure Vanilla confirmed, hands tensing like they needed something to hold. Why did they look so frightened? “Apologies, did I… I didn’t mean to alarm you, I’m merely-”
“Where’s your Souljam?” Candy Apple suddenly asked, standing beside Black Sapphire once more.
“...Pardon?”
“Your… Souljam,” she repeated. “If you’re really the Virtue of Knowledge… where’s your Souljam?”
“Ah-! Right,” Pure Vanilla rolled up the sleeve of his robe where his small Souljam was ingrained into the dough of his wrist. “Here.”
The siblings glanced at each other once more before Candy Apple tugged Black Sapphire away by his sleeve — most likely to confer. Black Sapphire dropped the hat behind him as he followed his sister around the bend, already murmuring.
Peculiar.