Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

I stared at you in silence.

There we were, face-to-face in the empty void of my own unconscious. The scientist and the assassin. Mirror images, two halves of a whole, the north and the south, confronting each other.

You had endured so much. You were cast aside soon after you were born, abandoned on a moonlit night.

Yes, abandoned. Abandoned by that monster of a playwright.

And yet, you endured. You were watched over by the old man, the one with sadness in his eyes and ice at his fingertips. He betrayed you, and you him. It’s hard to tell who was first. The truth is hidden in the darkness now.

You, sinful girl who ended the lives of so many people: you were taken prisoner before being released to atone, atone as an assassin. Under the blossoms of spring you met him, and entered a love of four seasons. You met, you became one, and then you two said your goodbyes. Goodbyes as cruel and unforgiving as the winter air surrounding you, the cold gnawing at your bones. You shivered, and you didn’t know why. Your tears fell into the snow, an infinitesimal contribution to the endless frost.

With your golden bullets, you took the lives of those you deemed evil: a murderous general, a corrupt judge, and yes, even your own mother. You determined that you couldn’t save the world, and so you decided to destroy it. You brought everyone down with you, because you couldn’t stand the idea of blaming yourself for your own misfortunes.

I don’t want you here. Go away.

I’m a new person now, the best version of myself. I’ve learned, I’ve forgiven, I’ve grown. Your, my, our memories are best kept locked away, in a black box with no key. So please, I’m begging you, don’t do this to me.

“But then, I’m a part of you,” you finally spoke up. I could deny it as much as I wanted but, you were right. You were a phantom of the past, and I was your vessel, soul given flesh. We’re inseparable, you and I. Who am I without you and who are you without me? You became me, and I became you. It’s a mobius strip, a ouroboros, a twin-headed dragon biting its own tail.

I held out my hand. You looked down at it, uncertain, but took it in yours in the end. You smiled a weary, bittersweet smile. I smiled back, and we both began to laugh. We held each other in our arms, melting and turning together like the words in a lullaby. I was the light, you were the dark; I was the sun, you were the moon. As we held hands, creating a beautiful sunset sky, I knew the truth: that there was no you, no me, only us.

And that’s just how it should be.

Chapter Text

In the beginning, I was no one.

Who am I? Who am I? Who am I? Who am I? Who am I?

The answer is no one.

I have no mother, no father. I was made, not born. Perhaps “you” are my father? You who teach me words as always.

I still do not know what to say. What words would be appropriate, I wonder? I feel what I feel, and yet I cannot hew my emotions into cloth, into the fabric of existence. So when the time came that you cast me aside, I couldn’t say anything.

Silence.

It is from silence that words emerge. One cannot speak in the midst of noise. One cannot create without the main ingredient: nothing. And so, a blank emptiness is needed. I need it, the way a craftsman needs a clean desk, the way a novelist needs a blank page.

I wrote stories before. Stories of servants and princesses, evil witches, women and men gone mad. I wrote about the world, and how I experienced it.

And so, words.

“You” taught me words. Words are sounds, spoken, shared, remembered. Each note is a letter; put letters together and you are back to one word. Words, you put together, and string them into a song.

What song do I write? Perhaps, a song for the weary “you”. A song for those trapped in their delusions, a song of truth. A song that echoes through time, and colors the universe with its melody. A song that resounds lu li la, lu li la.

This song, I will use as my golden key. With it, I will unlock the door to the unknown. I will use the words to find answers, to say what I feel, to find “you”. But first, I will use it to open Pandora’s box, and finally find out who I am.

...Oh. Inside this box. Is nothing but

Evil.

Chapter Text

I’m so sorry, Professor. I wasn’t able to complete my mission.

I tried, believe me. I trekked through a desert, climbed mountains, crossed the sea. I weathered storms and snow and wind. I did everything I could.

Just to be with you.

I wanted to talk to you. I wanted to make conversation with you. But I suppose that’s too late now.

The you standing before me is nothing more than an empty shell.

Just like this planet, huh? How pitiful. In the end, I couldn’t save it.

Good morning, the you in my cached memory says to me. I want to say “good morning” back, but the words cannot form. They are stuck in my throat, and cannot come out.

What’s this? Can robots cry…?

To the sun, moon and stars,

To the coelacanth’s tail and riddling sphinx and sunbathing angel,

Good morning, and goodbye.

When there is nothing left on the face of the Earth, this sapling will still survive. I just know it will. I’ve dubbed its species “millennium tree”, able to withstand even the most extreme growing conditions and live up to a thousand years. With its variable DNA, its seeds will spread and mutate, growing into other species.

It is the Earth’s biodiversity distilled into a single seed.

It is humanity’s last hope for life on this planet.

My time is limited, although I can rest easy knowing I’ve entrusted it to the last of my “helpers” - an autonomous android named Zvezda. She will keep it safe, and deliver it to its destination when the time comes.

BB

Chapter Text

The darkness is the world’s first glutton.

It eats and eats and eats, engulfing everything it can get into its maw. It consumes, gorges, grows. It spreads like a plague, filling each gap that the light cannot reach.

Meta knows she is the same.

When she wakes up, the first thing she feels is a deep, gnawing hunger. She feels it to the very depths of her being. Her beloved children. They were taken from her. Taken by that thief, running off into the moonlit night. She wants them back.

She decides to search for them. Left, right, and deep down below. She will not stop until she does. She will not be satisfied.

She will search and search and search. Every nook, every cranny, every dark crevice etched into the earth. She will sweep the world, and dissolve it in the acids of her stomach if she must. Until her hunger is satisfied.

Come, eat without leaving anything.

Chapter Text

The ‘Original Sinner’, hm?

The false mother. She who birthed and raised the seven horrors.

How fitting. Just as they return to the forest, they too shall return to her heart. The sword, the glass, the mirrors, the doll, the blades, the spoon. I can feel them melting and turning together, like the gears of a clocktower. They each play a note, producing a discordant capriccio.

Oh?

There’s one missing.

In the middle of the battlefield, the hero takes up his sword.

Is he really a hero? He’s deceived many people, caused a great amount of heartache. Presumptuous is he for ever thinking he deserved such a title. He’s no hero, no saint, no warrior.

Just a man.

His companion, the former goddess, urges him to choose: his wife, or the world? The thousand-year story’s climax is at hand. As time and conflict etch strongly onto his heart, he decides to march forward. He will not die here. By his hands and everyone else’s, the world will be remade. It is no longer his enemy, nor is it his wife’s.

People are greedy. He knows he is the same.

Someone, anyone, tell me.

What in the world is “evil”?

Hands that wallowed in greed and were sullied in sin, shall I wield my blade in atonement?

My dearest wife.

I will save you.

And soon, the rain will stop.

Chapter Text

Once upon a time, there was a Sunheart Girl.

She had no parents, no past, no name. Her sole duty was to play with the words that made up the world, and to guide it forward.

She was the first of her kind.

Eventually, the Sunheart Girl heard a tune. It was a calming one that healed her lonely heart. It went lu li la, lu li la.

She wanted a family.

Once upon a time, there was a Moonsong Boy.

He wasn’t a real boy. He was built by a solitary woman who lived alone on a farm. All the woman had for company were him, her beloved stories, and the rice fields they called home.

Eventually, the Monsoong Boy heard a tune. It was a healing one that warmed his lonely heart. It went lu li la, lu li la.

He wanted a sister.

A star fell down from the heavens.

As the Moonsong Boy’s mother was cooped up inside, whether asleep or playing her beloved stories,

He ran up to catch the star. The star was a girl, with a face much like his. If they swapped places, no one would have noticed.

They fell to talking that night. Each one, an irregular in their own right. The girl was a glitch, the boy was a tool. They both wanted to be something more than what they were born to be.

Eventually, the Sunheart Girl and the Moonsong Boy decided they would live as brother and sister. They happily walked home together, hand in hand, producing a beautiful orange sky.