Chapter Text
Descend.
The sounds of the artifact's fire crackling and the wooden elevator creaking as Kao's sent downwards to the prison cell pervades the crushing silence and darkness. They felt a nervous pang tightening their chest, and their heart races fast. After too long, they had finally come back to end their friend's long yet restless slumber. But too long has it been, and Kaonashi doesn't know if their friend would forgive them.
Can't blame them if they never will. No one deserves to be forgiven after this long. All of this may be worthless, but Kao wants another try.
Whether or not they will be forgiven for anything is left in the dark, but as the elevator halts, now is the moment.
The door creaked open, and in front, there was a small, cramped, dodecagonal room. At the very end, was a lantern – an old lantern – with a sputtering, coral green flame. Beyond that? Darkness. Kaonashi was, simply put, afraid. The dead silence of the room felt anathema to life, as though Kaepora had vanished and left nothing behind. The crackling lantern, however, showed otherwise.
A gangly hand crept out from the darkness, as something resembling an unearthly howl came from the blackness. The hand gripped the lantern, and the fire brightened. Red shawl. Gleaming eyes. One horn. Kaepora. They stood there, silent, face to face with their pale-feathered friend. They… Came back. The howl, which was more akin to a tired groan that the acoustics picked up, stopped.
Kaonashi knew not what to do, instead just standing there in stunned silence, as did Kaepora. Kaepora was still here. How long had it been…?
"..."
Their old body creaked and moved closer to Kaonashi, their joints popping and every bit of their movement slightly audible, from the squelches of their eyes squinting to take a better look, to their mouth opening to make use of their cords.
"…You." Kae said with a low tone.
"Me. Kaonashi."
Kaonashi simply said those two words as they stood there, placing their lantern down on the ground. They raised their hands slightly, to show they meant no harm.
"It's me."
Moving not so much as an inch further, they inhaled deeply.
"It's been too long, hasn't it?"
They responded with a blank expression, digging through the recesses of their blank mind. "…too long. Were you the reason I stayed?"
Kae turns their back to their visitor, grabbing their lantern and caressing it, the metal cool to the touch.
"I remember making a vow. This light, it will never fade until a friend enters the vault."
"…Time has not been kind to your memories, has it, friend? Perhaps… Perhaps I can show you around once more? Help you remember again."
Kaonashi picked up their lantern.
"Our bodies are gone. Our simulation is all we have left. Our simulation, and each other."
"I only remember what happened to me. I clung to as much as I can, but faces are lost during my stay." said Kaepora.
"Somebody gave me away, and deemed me unforgivable. Irredeemable, for what I have done. Setting a brief signal free, a signal that will cause death… and rebirth."
"…Then, perhaps this will jog your memory."
Kaonashi began to hum. The song. That old song, from what must have been millennia ago. The vision. The piece . The eclipse. The first verse, and then the second. There was no more to the piece . A pleasant melody, all the same. Familiar. Illuminating the cave paintings, the memories, that were smattered on the inside of Kaepora's skull.
If only a few moment, Kaepora smiled at the melody, before their memories became clear as moonlight, and their elation turned to devastation.
"…You… You were…" Kae looked at them with a frown, reclining slightly away from Kao.
"I was the one that sold you out, not knowing who you were. The signal went out. Someone had broken our laws. And I alerted everyone. I never meant for this to happen." Kaonashi sighed, hanging their head low. "There is still eternity left for me to atone, if you'll allow me that forgiveness."
"An eternity to atone with others, while I atone all alone?" Kae questions with a hard tone, slowly walking in circles around Kao.
They took a deep breath, before elaborating. "I think you misunderstand. You are free now. The door is open. The locks will never close again. Any who try to send you back here will find that I personally set the locks ablaze. Nobody shall ever imprison you again. Whatever you have had to atone for, surely millennia in solitude is too harsh – even for allowing the signal to escape. Do you understand?"
As the silence crushed everything, Kaonashi felt a dark, pitch-black rage well up in their being.
"Do you think I wanted you in here? That I never tried to set you free? This part of the simulation shouldn't even exist. If I knew how to get here, I would have been brute-forcing the code for however long it took to get you out. It took Enkidu, one of the people that helped make this place, telling me how to get here for any of this to happen!"
Kaonashi paused, and exhaled with a sharp sigh. A wave of sorrow washed over them.
"…You're right. Maybe I don't deserve forgiveness. Just… Take your freedom, I'm going home."
They turned around to leave.
Kaepora saw the hurt, and quickly regressed with a sigh. After so long, and this was how they reunited. They had to say something, they had to – they weren't going to waste all of it now. Looking up from the floor and towards Kao, they blurted out.
"…Wait."
Kaonashi stopped in their tracks, turning their head over their shoulder to look at Kaepora. They wordlessly acknowledged that Kae had something to say, but did not fully turn their body around.
"…Stay with me for a moment, Kao." Kaepora steps forward to their compatriot's back, and choked a plead. "We'll go home tonight, together."
Kaonashi turned all the way around. Thinking for a second, they nodded. "That we will, then. That said, it is sunset already, and so, perhaps it might be wise to either stay here the night or head for my home immediately… Your call, I suppose."
"I want us to stay here. It's… comforting, to have you here. Let us sit." said Kaepora, sitting on the floor. How pitiful, to think of this cell as anything comforting.
Kaonashi nodded and sat down, legs crossing as they sighed. "I missed hearing your voice. I'd nearly forgotten the sound…"
"Equally I missed seeing your face. I had forgotten almost everything, but I tried to keep you." They tried to reenact a memory of theirs that was so distant, and awkwardly placed their hand on Kao's neck, letting it stay there instead of caressing it. It's… warm, something Kae hasn't felt in a long time.
Kaonashi closed their eyes and soaked up the sensation. They jolted at how cold Kaepora was, though. " Moons above, Kae, you must be freezing down here… I would say it's warmer up above, but it's the end of fall, so… It's likely going to snow soon."
"The cold isn't so bad now, but I fear your warmth may make me averse of it once more." Kae smiled, and kept their hand still while continuing. "My vision, with the dreaded piece … H ad it become true?"
"That, I am not sure about… The dam has yet to break, but time outside is now foreign to us. Were it to ever falter, we all would be gone soon after without power. I can only hope it comes true soon… But, in the meantime, I think we both have dreamed while awake too much as of late. Perhaps resting for a while would be prudent?"
Kae furrowed. "I have rested for an eternity, and there are only questions. What does my vision foretell? What does it mean? Why has it appeared in my life and molded me the being I am now?"
"Not everything has an answer, and of the things that do, not all of them are meant to be solved alone. We have gone far with that vision, but perhaps it will take another's perspective – another place, another time – to answer what it is in full. You have pondered and iterated and thought and mulled about the one thing you have yet to answer, and I think it is time to give it a rest, if only for now. There is a time for turmoil, and a time for tea."
"Indeed… You are welcome to rest upon me, if you would like. I imagine there is not a single comfortable surface left in this… To be blunt, in this claustrophobic hell-room. Same four walls, day in, day out." Kaonashi laid down on the hard ground, a bit bitter about how hard the flooring was (even if the cruelty was the point of it), but chest prime for use as a pillow.
"If it makes the situation better, I still got to see the stars with my telescope." Kae finds the feathered chest of Kao too tempting to resist, and laid their head on top of them. Feeling another being's breathing, their chest rising and falling, the warmth emanating and their feathers soft was enough to give chills to the lonesome prisoner.
Kao sighed calmly, and closed their eyes.
"It's been too long since you've seen snow, hasn't it?" The allure of sleep was similarly tempting to the pale-feathered Owlk, but forced themselves to not give in for just long enough to hear how Kaepora responded.
"It's been too long since I have seen anything. But… I see you now."
Kae's eyes tugs heavier and heavier until they closed their eyes, and turned their head to bury a cheek on their friend's feathers, while Kao gets to take a good look at them sleeping peacefully. Kao smiled to themselves, their eyes opening for a bit to watch Kaepora sleep. It was nice, watching them finally have some kind of comfort after so long.
The quiet night, across old eyes, in the ancient light, it's always wise.
The sky is overcast as snow trickles down, the river frozen as they both held their hands and skid across the ice, taking in the cold air. Too long has Kae smelled the air outside, yet there's little difference. None of this is ever real, and these two are already dead in the eyes of the universe. All of this could be seen as an overdue eulogy, after the end of a tragic story. But even if none of it is real, who is to say it doesn't matter? The one-antlered was utterly lost in their own thoughts as they stared upwards to the clouds, mumbling to Kaonashi at a barely-audible level.
"Have you ever wondered, Kao, what would happen if we did reach the Eye? Would we die? Would we survive it all? Would it even do anything?"
Kaonashi slowed down their sliding to skate alongside Kae, following their gaze up to the false sky.
"We all thought the Eye was evil, that it would destroy us… But now? I do not believe it is so. I believe it is merely… Inevitability. We have withered, we have died, and all it takes is a little push for the new to grow atop the old. That is the way of things, like fungi on a log or crops from compost. The Eye did not show us what we would do , it showed us what would happen . I do not know what would happen if we interacted with the Eye, but I think we would not survive – i f only for us to be the basis of something new. A flower, grown from a withering skull – as it showed us so long ago."
Kaepora nods to the long-winded answer, but as they were about to respond with a piece of their own, their hoof slipped from the ice and they fell on their back to the frozen leg, grunting as the friction made them slide ever so slightly.
"Oof, I- heh, guess I'm not used to walking." Kaepora joked, trying to get up but their legs slipped away every time.
Kaonashi skated over, slowing down beside Kaepora, before getting wobbly and similarly mugging out. On their back as well, they looked over first at Kaepora.
"Well… Here's as good a place as any to die!" Kao snickered a bit at their own joke, before trying to get up… And failed. Several times, actually. The ice was especially smooth and slippery here.
"Oh, great… I guess we can lay here a while." Kao turned their head to face the sky, sighing – but not in defeat, rather in a little bit of exasperation. This was fun, all the same.
This caused Kaepora to giggle and pull Kaonashi to themselves, hooking their arms on each other. "I admit, this is rather comfortable. I wouldn't mind spending the days here until the ice melts."
" Yes, but we p robably should get up before the ice really melts and we f all . " Kaonashi commented, but Kaepora doesn’t seem to mind the freezing cold crawling up their back.
" It’s fine. I don’t think the world is advanced enough to account for that. " They joked back, as the two hooted in laughter, filling up the night sky.
With a smile, they looked up to the stars filling the sky, watching them together. In spite of the cold, Kae's heart felt… strangely warm.
"I don't think I've seen these stars up close… I think I've forgotten the constellations." Kaepora spoke, before pointing at a patch of stars with a sort of a swoop. "Is that Osidius?"
Kaonashi snickered. "Yep, think so! And that one over there!"
They pointed at a collection of stars in a vaguely square shape. "That one is… Uh… I forgot…"
They squinted a little harder, trying to figure out what constellation it was… But the stars soon disappeared. A black, circular shape began to form in front of them, moving close to their sun. "Oh! An eclipse! It's been so long since we've had one!"
"An eclipse? I shouldn't be surprised, but I thought they did not integrate it here." Kaepora squints, seeing the second contact of the sun and giant. "I vaguely remember seeing an eclipse such as this…"
"That's the day you played that song, remember? The one I tried to jog your memory with earlier... Means it worked, didn't it?"
They squinted as well to look at it a bit better.
"The eclipses are rare but consistent. Your prison has a fake planet and fake sun, separate from these. I doubt you had been in the simulation long enough to even see one."
Kaonashi took a deep breath.
"Let's enjoy this. A fleeting moment, and the beauty of it. Here one second, and gone the next... A beauty in that which is impermanent."
The planet moved closer into position by the sun, blocking part of its light with a burst of light. In the simulation, it could be stared at directly without incurring blindness, at least.
Bearing witness to the totality of the eclipse, Kae huffs a shaky breath as they spoke with a faltering voice.
"Kao, I… I don't want to go. You brought me to live again, and now I'm scared."
They wiped a tear from the eye. "It's not fair."
"…Then we can stay right here, until you feel like we can leave. There are other things waiting for us, another where, another when. For now? Let us enjoy this…"
Looking up at the darkening sky, a ring of light around the murky blackness signaled a new era for them both. Kaonashi, an existence with their friend returned. Kaepora, an existence free from their bindings. Not everything could last forever, as nothing ever did, but is there not a morbid beauty in that? Perhaps an ethereal, calming beauty? The leaves grow, turn orange, and then fall. Snow is here for but a while. We grow up, but then grow old, and then decrepit.
We are not meant to last forever, and perhaps that's okay. All things must come to an end, so why not enjoy the beauty of things that fade rather than dread their end? Enjoy the ride for the ride, not for its destination.
See the skies and all the land together again, see the way the earth stays below.