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There was freedom, at the end of it all. Mind and silk, whatever rags once made you were drowning in the Void. Your mother lashes and bears and screams as she will succumb, one way or the other. And she will succumb! Your hands and legs and face heavy with a loss you can’t wrap your silly head around it.
You already let the abyss take you whole.
Of course, little spider couldn’t leave well enough alone.
Despite the apocalypse likely happening above, you two dance. Half from laughter and half puppeted, you embrace the power to attack this foolish bug who guards a flower of all things! Your silk rips and tears and is filled up with black thread, and for a moment, all was beautiful as the spider took a hit she didn’t prepare for.
Willing or not, one of you will sacrifice their life in this cocoon.
Yet, as if fate was laughing, it was the spectator who would be no longer.
The memory is fresh like your wounds and are just as scattered. You blink and wake up above the end. Little spider looks over to you, her cloak tattered like your body and smelling of pride. Of this pride origin? Was it that her goal was finished? A point proven right? An insecurity settled? At all this; you simply let the emotions flow out of your mandibles as she gets closer.
She says she won’t patch up everything, that once you’re back to settlement she’ll fully heal the unraveling silk. Says that the soft touches and stitching is simply to make sure her work won’t become undone. You no longer laugh not out of agreement, but because there’s something in your throat making it hard not to sob.
Spider shouldn’t be doing this. You wanted to be right, to be better. Spider might’ve not needed to fight, you didn’t need to be alive, and yet here you are: at her mercy yet healing.
You already knew healing hurt, and yet this stings worse.
You don’t know what you want anymore. You’ve made a fragile peace with your existence at your mother’s presence, her mercy, her wishes. You knew what would happen if you displeased her enough, what she or Spider have done to Phantom you refuse to forgive. And yet she claims you’re worthy of life.
Once she’s done, little spider forces you to hook yourself around her body, checking to see if your strength wouldn’t fail either of you. She starts her climb out of the abyss and you know she’s determined to prove you wrong. That your unique nature isn’t a self-fulfilling curse.
You don’t laugh, you don’t have the strength to, but there’s a simple joy in knowing this confusion will last.