Chapter Text
Self-knowledge is a terrible and wonderful thing. King sees himself, clearly, for the first time in a very long time, and is relieved, because he sees now that he must stop.
He is horrified, because he has fallen so, so far.
He screams, begging himself to stop, but the other King, the King of only moments before, his face tight with rage, does not listen. He beats his fists against the mirror, seeing his own wild eyes reflected back at him, thinking desperately that destroying this monster is the only way he can possibly begin to atone.
He breaks through, stumbling through shards of glass, and loses himself to a deep, gray silence.
-
Awareness returns slowly, and with it the curious feeling that eons have gone by in seconds. King breathes, blinks, moves. There is a syrupy tension in his limbs, a cloying exhaustion that weighs him down.
He props himself up on his elbows, fighting to keep his eyes from slipping closed, and finds himself face-to-face with a stickwoman.
“Um. Hello?”
The stickwoman regards him gravely, her head tilted slightly to one side. Her face is ghostly pale against the curtain of her dark hair. “Hello,” she says, the word strangely measured, as if she has given a great deal of thought to it.
“Where am I?” King asks. He looks around, but he cannot seem to remember what he sees; the sight fades from his mind as soon as he looks away, and he is merely left with the unsettling impression of endless gray.
“You are in the Void.” The woman settles herself, sitting cross-legged before him. King finds himself sitting, too, and despite his greater height he cannot shake the feeling that the woman looms.
“The Void?”
“The place in between. Data lost, but not gone.” The woman reaches out, taking his wrist and turning it so that he can see the inside of his forearm. Fernlike white races across his skin.
King remembers agony, if only distantly, and a fierce desperation. He frowns, tracing the scars with one finger, as he tries to pinpoint what it was that he was so desperate to reach.
A sly smirk half-hidden by bright hair flickers in the corner of his vision, and he stills.
“Purple.” His voice is a broken gasp. “Is she – did I – ”
The woman’s serene expression does not change, but her eyes seem to gentle. “She is here. I am guarding her.”
Something about the woman’s voice catches King’s attention. He feels a sharp burst of anger, but it fades quickly into bitter resignation. Regret.
“From me?” he asks.
The woman nods, her expression neither angry nor judging. Simply…watchful. “Even from you. She is so very tired, you know.”
King stalls. Tired is not a word that he would have ever thought to apply to Purple, in life. She has always been so driven, so fiercely determined, so alive. But…
But it is the truth, he realizes with burgeoning shame. He can see it now, see it in the way her shoulders always slump whenever she thinks he is not looking. In eyes that are too deep and old for someone so young. In the way she always holds herself at arm’s length, distancing herself from the world even as she seems desperate to try to prove herself to it.
“She has had a hard life,” the woman says softly, and for a moment King almost thinks he sees Purple, her head in the woman’s lap, fast asleep and so painfully young. The woman strokes her hair gently, head bent over the sleeping girl, and when she looks up again Purple is gone. “But even after all that, she still wants to hope.”
Of course she does, King thinks. He has never met anybody so fiercely stubborn in all his life.
“Please,” King says, and then stops, because he does not know what, exactly, he is asking for. He struggles for a moment, hoping words will come. Then he sighs. “Please,” he begs.
The woman studies him for a long moment, eyes cool and thoughtful. She does not seem to hate him, though she should. Somehow that makes her judgement so much worse.
“Grief is a terrible thing,” the woman says. “What happened was a tragedy, and I grieve with you. But what you have done is not excused by that.”
“I know,” King whispers. He does not question how she knows about his son. “I know. I’m so – cursors, I’m so sorry.” He meets the woman’s eyes. “I am glad I am dead, if this is the man I’ve become. What I’ve done is unforgivable.”
The woman frowns sternly, anger swirling in her eyes. “Nothing is unforgivable, so long as there is regret. And you do regret it, don’t you?”
“Yes,” King whispers. He laughs, a fractured sound muffled by unshed tears. “She is always helping me. She showed – she showed me – ”
She showed me what I had become, when I killed her.
The woman bows her head, a small smile curving her lips upward. She holds her arms out, and King extends his without thinking about it. When he draws back, Purple is in his arms, her head resting against his shoulder. He can feel soft breaths tickling his collarbone as the girl sighs in her sleep, shifting a little until her face is hidden against his shirt.
She is so light. King knows that she is tall for her age, but she seems to have so little substance, cradled against his tall frame like this.
She would be mortified if she could see herself in this moment, King knows. She is so independent, so determined to prove that she is not a child.
King brushes the hair out of her face, gently tucking it behind one ear. The rumpled purple locks are thick and unruly, and King has to swallow a surge of grief as he remembers how Gold’s hair was just the same way. It was short, of course, but Gold had never met a hairbrush that could tame his hair. Somehow he knows that Purple hasn’t, either.
She’s just a kid. Too mature and fractured and responsible, but a kid all the same.
King looks up. The woman is watching them both, expression halfway between fond and regretful.
“Please,” King rasps. “I don’t care what happens to me, but please, if there’s any way to send her back…” He trails off, rocking the sleeping girl slightly. A tear drips off his nose, hitting Purple’s cheek, and she frowns and mutters something under her breath before settling. “She’s just a kid. She doesn’t deserve this.”
“She thinks she does,” the woman says, expression fully grieved. “She does not love herself, this little one.”
King shudders, tightening his grip on her.
“Please,” he begs again. “If there is any way for me to make this right, I will do it.”
The woman hums thoughtfully. She stretches out a hand, cupping Purple’s cheek and rubbing her thumb along the girl’s cheekbone. Purple’s eyelashes flutter.
“Mom?” Purple whispers, her voice a whisper-thin thread of longing.
“No, dearest,” the woman says, sorrowful and affectionate all at once.
“Oh,” Purple says, and King bites his lip as tears trickle down Purple’s cheeks, tracing their way down the fernlike white scars marring her bright skin.
The woman holds out her arms, and King passes the girl to her reluctantly. The woman rocks Purple back and forth, folding the girl effortlessly into an embrace despite the fact that Purple is actually taller than she is.
“It’s time to wake up,” the woman whispers, her forehead resting against Purple’s. “Can you come back to us now?”
“Why?” Purple asks, voice small and distant.
“There is a question I must ask you, dear one.”
“Do I have to?”
“No,” the woman says. King shifts anxiously, but the woman silences him with a glance. “But I think you should.”
Purple heaves a sigh. “’M so tired,” she whispers, tears coming thick and fast from closed eyes.
“I know,” the woman whispers. “I know, dearest.” She cups Purple’s cheek again, and for a moment King sees another woman leaning over them both, hand cupping Purple’s other cheek. The second woman is small and slender, with bright pink hair coiled into a low bun.
King studies the second woman, seeing Purple in the heart-shaped face, in the sweet bow of the woman’s lips.
Not yet, the second woman seems to say. Her lips do not move, but King can hear her voice, low and gentle. Not yet, little bird.
Purple whimpers, leaning into her mother’s touch in that moment. When her eyes slip open, her mother is gone.
“There you are,” the dark-haired woman says, tapping Purple’s nose with an affectionate smile.
Purple blinks.
“Oh,” she says. She sits up a little, though she doesn’t pull away from the woman like King had half expected her to. Her eyes drift around, taking in the gray. They slide over King as if she can’t quite see him, though a small frown creases her brow.
“I’m dead?” Purple asks, and there’s something a little unsettling about the neutral, inquiring tone of voice she uses. As if being dead is just…not so surprising.
“Not quite, dearest,” the woman says. She tucks Purple’s hair behind her ear, the thick purple locks having escaped again since King handed her over. “You have a choice to make.”
“Must I?”
“Yes, dear one.” The woman presses her forehead to Purple’s, cupping the back of her head gently. “You must.”
Purple is silent for a long moment. Then she exhales, slumping forward a little to hide her face in the crook of the woman’s neck.
“This is not a choice given to many,” the woman says softly, rocking Purple again. “But that does not mean you must take it.”
“I – ” Purple swallows. “I want to,” she confesses. “I really, really want to, but…”
“But you’re scared.”
“Yes,” Purple whispers.
“Don’t be.” The woman presses a loving kiss to Purple’s temple. “You will be all right, little one, no matter what you choose. You have suffered so much, but you’re not broken. You will find happiness, I promise.”
“Then I will choose,” Purple says softly, and closes her eyes again.
“Good, dearest.” The woman traces her finger down the line of Purple’s nose, tapping it gently. Then she looks up, meeting King’s gaze. “And what do you choose?”
King gasps as the possibilities she is offering him blossom into view. He swallows thickly, blinking back tears.
He tells the woman his choice, his eyes on the girl in her arms, and the woman smiles.
“Do better,” she tells him, reaching out to cup his cheek just as she had Purple’s. “And be happy.”
She withdraws her hand, and the moment her touch leaves his cheek, King is sent back.