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"Bro, when's your birthday?" Parrot directed towards Theo with a sly grin, clearly planning something—but the duo in front of him were completely oblivious to what. Despite Wifies' intelligence, he couldn't figure out what type of devious joke Parrot was about to crack. Meanwhile, Theo seemed completely oblivious. He hesitated before responding, clearly knowing something was up.
"March 1st, why?" Theo asked with a tilt of his head, clearly wondering what the sudden question was about. Without a moment's hesitation, Parrot started walking—marching seemed like the better word. For a moment, the two stood there, perplexed by Parrot's actions. Until Wifies understood, and let out a soft "Ohhhh..." "What? I don't get it?" Theo asked, his eyebrows furrowed in clear confusion. Parrot simply chuckled and explained. "Well, I have to march first to know your birthday, right?" Theo's confused expression dropped and sighed. "Bro..." He was at a loss for words.
In return, Wifies gave a half-laugh as Theo hit Parrot twice—causing him to take a heart of damage. They continued walking through the grass fields, until Parrot snapped back to reality.
How did it get this bad?
Parrot had ran, his steps echoed while his mind went into overdrive—constantly overthinking the events of the day. Reina and Theo's location is unknown, Saparata took his crown, Wemmbu had betrayed him once again, and more. Everything felt like a weight that he had to carry since he was the king, was is a keyword.
He couldn't go anywhere, he didn't have anywhere to go; most of his allies had went against him, and he felt like the biggest fraud of the server. What happened to all of his plans to save the server? Maybe the server never needed a king in the first place. Maybe, Lettuce was right.
Parrot ran, checking his coordinates constantly, he had only one place in mind. It was somewhere he initially refused to go, it brought back memories of someone he practically despised. Despite his promise of remembering him as the Wifies he used to know, he realized, he remembered him as the Wifies who did all of these horrible things to him and his friends.
In the distance, he could see the cabin approaching; his feet burned with pain and agony, but he pushed himself further, not wanting to stop until he reached the small house. The air around him was cold now that he realized, his hands shook from it—but he kept going. He wrapped his hands around the scarf he had worn before, the scarf he had neglected so much just because of him.
His knees gave out just as he reached the door, he fell face-first into the snow—tears pricked at his eyes, and he couldn't hold them back. Just before he started sobbing, he sat up, clutching at the yin-yang pin that Wifies had given him as a gift, before all of this had fallen down onto his shoulders.
He let out quiet, broken sobs—the weight of everything pressing down on his shoulders; the curse had hit him once more. If Theo or Reina died, it was inevitable, it was his fault. The thought of their deaths being his fault as always, hit him like a stone brick to the head. Parrot sat there, sobbing uncontrollably against the cold wood of the cabin walls—his headwings were downcast, his clothes were disheveled with clear results of war.
He stayed there, sobs turned into cries. As time blurred, it eventually turned to hiccups—it reminded him back when Wifies was alive, when he was joking about how these hiccups annoyed him along with Wemmbu and Eggchan. They stayed at a trap for 15 minutes, waiting for a diamond player to get Wemmbu a mace—it still baffled him on how someone like Wemmbu could betray him.
Parrot finally glanced upward, the sun had already risen—arctic foxes and birds chirped from the distance, it was rare for mobs to spawn in the Unstable SMP since hundreds of thousands of players killed them daily. It took him all of his strength to stand up, his legs were wobbly and he had to steady himself with the wall behind him to stand up properly.
He wiped away his tear-soaked face with the scarf, occasionally sniffling and inhaling the fresh winter air. Nobody had come here in a long time, players would pass and not mind—which Parrot was thankful for. He finally took a few steps forward, stopping when he could see the entire cabin—the very one that he and Wifies built. He could still hear his voice loom at times, especially back when he was king. Speaking of voices, he could still hear the words that got him banished from spawn.
Parrot sighed as he searched through his inventory, eventually pulling out an axe. He headed towards the trees and chopped them down, his mind still reflecting on the war, the betrayals; he pushed those thoughts away and continued chopping.
Eventually, he had two stacks of wood—having dissociated mid-way and simply continued with his chopping. He sighed as he used the built-in crafting table in his inventory to create oak planks, and used those oak planks to create a crafting table. With the crafting table, he created signs and a pickaxe—a goal formed in his mind as he searched for any nearby caves to mine in. He was careful to avoid Wifies' old trap, remembering how Derapchu and Jumper had gotten trapped there before.
He eventually found a cave, approximately three hundred blocks from the cabin. It ached him to even be this far from such comfort, but it was necessary. He started mining a few stone blocks and quickly headed back towards the home—he only needed two or three anyways. His steps were muffled by the snow beneath his boots, the same boots he used to match with Wifies.
Parrot eventually arrived back at the cabin, he took a few steps back and placed three stone blocks on top of each other—he placed a sign on the second block and wrote:
R.I.P Wifies
You Will Live In Our Hearts
I'm Sorry -PX2
He dug the snow layered above the dirt, creating what seems to be a grave. He placed a flower he had picked up while running, and sat beside the grave—his eyes downcast while he hugged his knees against his chest. "I'm sorry I didn't build you a grave earlier." He mumbled, imagining as if Wifies could hear him from the skies and heavens above. "For the longest time, I couldn't bring myself to." He admitted. clearly reluctant to do so.
Tears pricked at his eyes again, but he pushed them back; he refused to cry in front of Wifies, especially if he was watching him without his knowledge. He shook his head before he continued his mumbling. "I always called myself 'the server's smartest player,' but I had made countless, stupid mistakes." He sniffled, still trying his best to push back the tears that threatened to wash his face.
"Hundreds, even thousands of players fell under my leadership." He could faintly remember the thousands of death messages that popped up in the global chat, back when Cindercrest attacked Highwater. He couldn't remember a person that survived besides Reina and Theo. "My friends... they nearly died." His voice broke at the last word, he whispered these words softly—like petals flying through the wind.
"I... failed to protect spawn." Parrot admitted, his breath grew heavy and his hands shook at the admission—he hated feeling like he was wrong, but Wifies needed to know. Some way, or somehow. "I... I.. failed my oath to never become the rulers who ruined the server before." A stray tear broke out, the dam was breaking slowly with every word he admitted. He could still remember fighting against Lettuce, with Flame and Wemmbu by his side. He could remember lighting up the beacons back when Wifies had faked his death, when Ash used to conquer the server.
Suddenly, he started sobbing—the arms that wrapped around his knees suddenly felt too heavy. The pair dropped to his sides as he buried his head in his knees, he could only do so much as a king player. "I- I- I failed those who trusted me with their lives, blindly even..." He managed to admit in between sobs, his voice broken with held-back sorrow. The hundreds of items scattered across the grass and stone of Highwater was still vivid in his memory, just like Wifies. "I even failed to listen to Theo." He cried, genuinely cried after months, or a year since Wifies' death.
"N- now? I don't even know where he is, nor where Reina is..." His nose felt runny, snot slid down quietly—but he wiped it away with his hand. It felt disgusting, but this was a vulnerable moment for Parrot. "H- have I told you a- a- about Reina...? I- I'm sure you'd be glad to meet her..." He managed, he would imagine that Wifies would get along with Reina pretty well—considering their similarities and logic.
Yet, he continued with this admission, this suffering he had to endure all because of his decisions. "I- I was so drunk on being the server's hope that I kept painting myself as the victim—not knowing I was the one who h- held the brush." He hiccuped, tears slowly dried on his face—but new ones formed and dropped down silently, as if acknowledging the vulnerability of the moment. "I- I'm so foolish to think that this server ever needed a king."
".... No server is even supposed to have one." He added quietly, monarchs could only last so long in servers like Unstable—not with hundreds of new players joining every day to have a fun time. "A- And... I think you'd be disappointed in the player I am today..." He admitted quietly, his tear streaked face was dry and felt sticky, almost as if it was made by slime. His eyes were downcast, and he didn't know he was even clutching at his scarf until he stopped talking.
"I'm sorry, Wifies." The name felt heavy with unspoken history, memories came back to him like a flood—but he ignored them. Simply trying to ground himself with the cold snow beneath him and the stone that he leaned and depended against. His breathing was heavy, he couldn't bear the thought of sitting here any longer—but his legs felt too heavy yet too numb to bring him anywhere.
Suddenly, Wifies had appeared from behind a tree—Parrot noticed his translucent figure and his breath hitched. Had he been watching him all along? He could tell he was a hallucination, maybe even a ghost due to the lack of visibility in his figure—but it was unmistakably Wifies. He felt like he couldn't breathe, as the figure slowly walked towards him—stopping only a few feet away.
He pulled out the original spyglass, the one that Parrot gave him before his permanent death in the Paragon—and used it to look at Parrot. Parrot's eyes widened and tears suddenly flowed back to his eyes, he couldn't remember how long it had been since he had arrived here. "W- W- W- Wifies...?" Parrot asked with a broken voice, he looked oh, so vulnerable for someone who used to hold so much power. Parrot's wings twitched and instinctively hugged his figure, warming up the coldness that had quietly crept in during his admission.
"As wrong as your actions are," Wifies started, his voice clear as day and it reached Parrot's ears softly. "I still care about you, Parrot." He practically whispered, a silent confession carried by the wind. He hid the spyglass back into his pocket, the faded out feather still stood out from his hair—the feather that Parrot had given him once and got stuck in his hair.
He took a step closer, and glanced downwards at Parrot—before kneeling carefully, slow enough to not cause any sudden movements. He didn't want to alarm Parrot, even if it's through a hallucination. "Please Parrot," The words slipped out of his mouth, Parrot flinched at the familiarity of the phrase. "Take care of yourself, for me at least."
Parrot suddenly tried to reach out, he lunged forward to wrap his arms around Wifies—his eyes practically begging for comfort, only to grab at air. Like nothing had ever appeared, like Wifies was never there. His hands trembled and he could feel the dam breaking once more.
"I- I- I'll tell you about Reina, yeah?"