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The final days are always the quietest. When the boisterous soldiers are laid to rest and the brothers that sang their funeral rites are picked off one by one, the world begins to fill the space comradery held with mournful silence. The sun still rose and the night still set because time would always keep moving. Even when the last of the troops are gone and the battle has been finished and even if there's no one left to give the fallen their ferry coins, time will still carry the winds and the seasons. Through death and life and joy and sadness time will keep it's steady pace.
Owen knows this truer than any other mortal soul. So as she kneels before the garden of stone with it's ten monoliths each carefully erected and etched with the names of souls given stolen second chances, she's filled with nothing but resignation. All he can hope for is that Apo will make him one to match and maybe the gods will be kind and give them all a place on earth to be remembered. Owen doesn't know. Owen knows many things and yet Chronos has kept the outcome of today tight-lipped. No premonition, no memory, only faith.
The day is dipping low, the warmth is leaving the air so it's only a matter of time before Owen and Apo are summoned for the final battle. She knows Apo is on the bridge hacking away at the training dummy Nikos left behind. Owen knows there's tears running down her cheeks as her swings are fueled with emotion. Owen knows he wants to hug her and pretend the sands of the hourglass won't run out but that's not how this will end. Owen might not be able to see the outcome this time, but she herself has decided how it will end.
The summoning is beginning as Owen stands, resting his hand on the chest sitting in the eleventh slot he placed there himself. It has his armor, his food, his glistening apples and all his tools. This way Apo won't have to carry so many things to lay him to rest.
Blinking unseeing eyes, Owen hears crying and feels the sand of the arena beneath her feet. There's a rustling of feathers before him as a clock chimes it's heavy sound. Despite it all, she smiles.
“Hello, Apo,” Owen calls
“Owen, I-,” Apo musters through the chokehold of grief “I don't want to do this!”
“It's alright,” she reassures “You're skilled enough and I have no armor. It will take no more than a swing, maybe two. You'll get your wish! Save your people, Apo. You'll do great back there,”
“I don't care! It's not fair!” Apo screams as she rushes towards Owen only for him to hear her footsteps falter not that far from him “Why can't we both go back? It doesn't have to be like this! I know at the start all I wanted was to win but-but this isn't winning…,”
Owen reaches forward slow and searching, feeling Apo grab her hand. She trails her calloused fingers up the feathered arm of the woman she adores until she can touch Apo’s cheek. The downy feathers there are damp and frazzled from salty tears Owen can feel dripping down even now. He smoothes them over, cradling her warm cheek. Apo grips his hand and wrist like a lifeline before launching herself into his arms. The seconds tick as the bell rings louder and louder. Only Owen can hear it, he knows. The gods want an outcome. Slowly, she pulls away from Apo and holds her a pace away from herself. The staff she's been using to move around clatters to the floor and she hears the little wind chimes Scott had gifted her make a tinging noise. He can imagine it almost perfectly, the curving wood with its adornments of all the friendships carved out in these lands. The feathers from Pearl, Pyro, and Apo, an iron rivet from Abolish, spiraling ivy from Cleo, bells from Drift, arrow fletching from Nobody, a copper bit from Sausage, a small goat horn cup from Nikos, all tied together with the braided ribbons from Shelby. All of it laid out on the ground where Owen will soon meet it. The death bells demand an ending.
“It's okay, Apo. I'm okay, really! I never had any hopes or dreams like you did; like any of them did. I was always alone and just trying to find my next meal. I- I've never had anything like this before. I didn't have to worry about starving because there was always something in the chests and I never went cold again because you always kept so many blankets and I wasn't alone anymore because I had all of you. Please, Apo, if this is all I ever get then I am more than happy to go. I'm more than happy to go…,”
“No dream is worth losing you,” Apo murmurs, voice wet with tears
“You have given me something no dream ever could. Love. You've given me love, I've never had love before,” Owen confesses, tears coming to her own eyes this time
Apo sobs something painful and heavy as Owen lets go of her. She can hear the girl struggling to wipe away the cascade of tears from her eyes while Owen pulls the one thing left on him. A knife. She knows the moment Apo sees it as a frantic stream of denials start up. He holds it out to Apo, blade pointing right at the resting point Owen is anticipating; his heart. He knows the dagger well, forged right at the start while they were still crawling out of the underworld through those moss covered cave tunnels. Owen didn't think to question the urge to build one then, the answer sits right before them now.
“I can't, Owen, I can't! Don't do this to me, please don't!” Apo begs
“I love you,” Owen replies simply as he takes her hands and guides them close around the leather clad hilt and rests the blade against his chest “I’m happy to do this. In death, you've given me all the things I never had in life. I'm content with this. I'm at peace. Go get your wish, I trust you,”
It's the end. She's not scared. She was scared last time, starving alone and cold in the alleyway knowing no one was going to mourn her. She hopes Apo will enjoy her wish and liberate her people. He has no doubt Apo will do them all proud. Owen wishes he could see it.
Lips meet Owen's lips and a startled noise bubbles up from her chest. It's frantic and desperate but Owen gives in anyway until Apo is pulling away as sudden as she had drawn in. The cold metal of the dagger is dragged so quickly from her chest that it nicks the skin just barely leaving blood in its wake.
“Apo, wait what-,” Owen barely has time to question before the memory appears in his mind
“No dream is worth this,” Apo says with steely determination and Owen is suddenly hit with the memory of her holding the dagger to her own throat
“No! No wait Apo please-!”
But it's too late. Owen hears the knife slice through skin and the bells aren't ringing anymore and the wind has stopped and all Owen can do is scream. He catches her somehow but the dead weight drags them both to the floor. Her body is fading away into stardust while Owen tries to desperately grab pieces she can't even see. It wasn't supposed to be like this. This isn't what she wanted. What cruel fate is this? Why kind of hell has she been left to? There's no one left. There's no one to etch a name into the final monolith, Owen can't write. All of this will fall apart and nothing will be left to remember them all. Suddenly the thought hits that Owen has no coin for Apo. How will the ferryman let her cross? Apo was supposed to live! Apo was supposed to get her wish! She needs a coin, ferryman has to let her cross!
“You've done well, my child,” Chronos’ voice booms across the amphitheatre in its odd echoey overlapping manner “It is done now,”
“It shouldn't have ended like this-!” Owen cries as he clings desperately to the feathers Apo’s body left behind
“On the contrary, my girl, it was always going to end like this,” Chronos replies, the sound moving as the God comes closer “Hopes and Dreams and Winds and Song are all carried by one thing. Time. Time is the canvas every other thing tells its story on. The threads that bind them all together. It is what pulls the seas and carries the seasons. Constant, reliable. The sun will always come up tomorrow and the moon always after. Eventually, the forges soften to embers and the bands stop playing. This is how the world is and has always been,”
“I don't care!” Owen screams “I never cared about any of this! Of any thing! I didn't have dreams or ambition, I just didn't want to be hungry or freezing! All of them had a future! Something to strive for, to fight for! Not me, never me! Why couldn't they win? Why did I have to be alone again!? You can have all of time! I just wanted a moment with them…,”
This is the cruelest thing Owen has ever had happen to him. So many people live in fear of dying alone but dying alone had been kinder than this. Dying destitute cowering against the unforgiving stone between the buildings he'd slowly crawled across searching for warmth he'd never fine has been so gentle compared to this ravaging eternal pain consuming his insides. There had been no one to mourn her then, no one who cared enough to ask for a name she'd never had in life. No one offering half a shared blanket to hold her close by a fire late at night when neither could sleep. No one had been there to bake the bread for her or smelt the iron into usable ingots while they sat around a table sharing laughs and jokes. All of that had been nothing but a wishful fantasy during his living days but he'd had that here. She had had Sausage spinning tales while he cooked as Pyro wove a new blanket out of the wool Pearl had gathered from a chair nearby. She had had Apo softly laying her down to sleep when all of time became too much to bear. And it was all gone now. It was all gone and Owen was right back where she had been while alive, alone and cold with no one to mourn her when she goes.
“What do you wish for?” Chronos’ words interrupts her thoughts
“I want it back,” Owen cries “I know it's selfish and I know it may be cruel but I have never wanted anything before and I just want them back-!”
“As you Wish, my child,” Chronos answers with what almost sounds like a smile in its tone
Owen doesn't care to decipher it as he curls into himself. It's cold all around him as his head almost kisses the ground from how far he's hunched over the bundle of feathers in his hands. Pure panic consumes him as the feathers turn to dust just like the body of his dearest just had. He thinks he screams, he's not quite sure. On the edges of awareness, she feels sun against her skin as the wind makes the tears on her cheeks colder. There's rustling and movement around but there's not a single thing that could pull Owen from his mourning.
That is, until a warmth envelopes him. Startling hard enough to choke, Owen tries desperately to pull away from whatever force is holding him. There's words being said around him but the panic is far too all encompassing for Owen to understand a single sound. She manages to get an arm free and push only the freeze when she hits feathers. A name spills from her lips as the arms loose enough for Owen's cold fingers to explore the person before her. Feathers. He knows these feathers! Quickly, he drags his hands up and up until he feels lips and winged ears.
“Apo?” Owen whispers so timid and quiet as if a single sound will turn everything to dust again as he holds her cheeks
“It's me, yeah. It's me, Owen. You're okay. I've got you,” Apo whispers just as gently
“How-? You- you were dead. I held you and you were dead. Why? Why did you do it Apo? Why did you leave me alone? I would have died for you. I was ready to die for you! I didn't want anything, not like you! I just wanted it back. I wanted all of us back but you were gone and there was no one left and I was alone again and I-I didn't have a coin for you. I couldn't- oh gods, I couldn't write. I couldn't write your name to remember you, there was no one left-!” The words spill from her lips so quickly she's barely away she's the one saying them
“I’m sorry,” Apo repeats over and over as she tries to soothe her, running her clawed hands through her hair “It's okay. You got your wish, Owen. You got your wish,”
“What?” Owen pauses as the words Apo just said filter through his brain “What wish? I can't… I didn't… I don't remember much. I gave you the dagger but you-... And then Chronos was there but I… I can't remember what I said,”
It's then that Owen takes note of the grass beneath his knees. Pulling a hand from where it's been frantically clinging to Apo, Owen places his hand carefully on the ground and pats around the grass. He jumps when it finds a hand before the hand reaches back to hold him. The memory comes and Owen suddenly sees all the champions around him. They're before the blessing decent, all of them. Pyro hands Owen his guiding staff as Apo helps him stand up and grab it.
“I wished for this?” Owen questions
“I suppose so,” Drift answers back “All of us are here. Can't really remember the how part though. Like sure yeah I remember losing my third chance in the arena and I expected to go back to floating helplessly around in the River Styx but here we are!”
“It's actually kind of nice, not going to lie,” Nobody pipes up
“I get to see all the beautiful ones again! Great wish, my friend! Truly a great wish!” Nikos’ voice thunders into the space as he hugs Owen tight, nearly setting her off balance before Sausage stabilizes them
“Honest, I'm glad you won,” Shelby says “This is a much better wish than I could have come up with,”
The group trades murmurs as Shelby speaks something all of them were too embarrassed to admit. All of them had had a selfish wish and yet here Owen had been, wanting nothing more than to have them again. They were grateful but filled with guilt about how wishing for this would have never occurred to them.
“Well that's enough mushy gushy for me!” Nobody cuts it with a clap of his hands “C'mon now! There's plenty of stuff to do, get the houses back up and running and cook some food for everyone ya know!”
“No no I think we should all sit in a circle and talk about our emotions for a bit longer,” Abolish snarks
“Yes! Fighting is needed no longer so now plenty of time for love!” Nikos beams
“Oh, that I can get behind,” Scott purrs
“Nope! I'm out! You all can have your little orgy on your own time, I don't need to be hearing that!” Nobody yells
“He is right, we should make sure we have enough to settle in for the night,” Apo says as she holds Owen close
She lets herself be guided back to the bridge as the Feather Holders all follow. It's not silent anymore. The dusk is filled with laughter and friends again and it's so beautiful. Owen grasps Apo’s hand with a squeeze and takes in a nice slow breath. The others keep going ahead and disperse to gather the things needed for the night as Apo waits with Owen. She doesn't push, doesn't ask, just let's Owen have his moment.
“Thank you,” Owen whispers while the sun leaves her skin “Thank Gods,”
“We have each other. We'll be okay,” Apo confirms
“We'll be okay,” Owen reaffirms before moving towards home again “I need a nice long nap after this. Think I can convince Nikos to tell some grand story again? Maybe get Drift to cook that meal she made from the lamb and herb?”
“Yeah, yeah I think we can. Let's go home,”
“Home,”