Discover Top Posts Tagged with #hsr drabbles

❝ — SHALL I FOREVER MOLD YOU TO THE TETHERED SUN. ❞

𓏵 ( despite everything , it's still you ! )

८ sypnosis. When one bears their faithful eyes to the sun, they tend to look away, unable to take the blazing rays of the daylight - yet, that boy whom lies in wheat and bathe in love, his eyes revel in the dances of the sunlight ─ alternatively, when Phainon loses his heart, there are no limit to his impeding fixation.

(phainon x fem!reader) wc: 21.4k (it's worth it i promise stay w me now)

@ warnings; gory descriptions, childhood friends to (kind of) lovers, time travel trope, a LOT of angst, some comfort, no beta we die like Cyrene and the chrysos heirs, a lot of descriptive violence and blood, not for the weak of hearts im afraid, ANGST no comfort but also kind of comfort but i lowkey rip that away after, morally debatable phainon, obssesion, heavy angst, grief, depression, body horror, Phainon is just mad insane ngl ᝰ.ᐟ

── notes. this is my LONGEST fic yet, and I lost motivation like.. a ton of times lol. This fic may have costed me the most agony, time, and crashouts - and I don’t even like it that much. Anyway, have a fun ride. More notes will be at the end of the fic (◞‸ ◟)

O, muse, sing for the ballads of Amphoreus – the eternal land, partitioned by the wholly of one’s sinful adamant inclinations, and purity of one’s preponderance fleet-footed harmony. O, muse, forgive this sin of covetousness – forebode by the deliverer of this world.

Dawn is forthcoming, but will not emerge without first the settlement of dusk – and when that dawn arises with trepidation, a figure is torn apart – shredded unto the most deepest of the body, cleaved into the dawn. For to be the sun, one must first, burn like it.

You, are not an heir cladded with golden ichor amalgamated into the essence of your soul. Rather, you are but a single mortal, a normal – unprecedented one. Not intertwined with the fates of the heroes of Amphoreus, the strings have not once touched the nerves of your skin.

You are not a part of this cycle of ruinous sequence.

At least, that is how it was before.

⸝⸝ 𖤓𖤓𖤓

“Ne, (name), don’t you have a penchant for romantic epics?”

You turn to the pink haired girl – hair dancing softly in the wind as she smiles, the bark of the tree she seated adjacent swayed with the wind’s dance, leaves fell gently to the wheat below your feet, her hands held cards – tarot cards, you surmise. She was always one for those divination crafts.

“I do. But isn't it boring if it’s just romance?” You question, Cyrene turns her head up, eyes crinkling in the corner as she takes in your expression.

“My my, dear (name),” She clicks her tongue playfully, feet flopping against the wheat-like grass, Kephale’s dawn falling gently on her face.

“Love, is the credential of everything! You see, every one of us,” Cyrene gestures to herself, then to you. “..is born of love and desire.”

“Love is pretty complicated.” You purse your lips together, her words a confusing riddle – you were just children, what does love have to do with a soul young as you?

Cyrene sings a whine at your words. “Ne~ Romance doesn’t always mean love, it can be a tragic story, or – or a thrilling fight scene!”

You could not hold back a purse in your lips at that, a small smile blooms on your face, reverent as it comes. “So Cyrene likes all stories?”

She nods with glee, shuffling through her card deck. “Each of them.”

She lays down the card deck in front of you, and against your doubts, you sit in front of the girl cladded in a dress much familiar to her stature. The loquacious girl grins, drawing a card like it’s as easy as shifting through bundles of hay – and she brings it to your face, obscuring your vision of her for a second, then popping her head out from the side.

“Here, your card.”

You still for a moment, taking the card from her hands. The image depicts 2 – naked figures, a woman and man, reaching for something unseeable, a figure – an androgynous divine entity, held sacred above them both, wings spread anew, as if it’s gathering protection.

“The lovers?” You tilt your head at the card.

She giggles at your reaction. “The lovers. It’s fitting, isn’t it?”

You raise a brow at her words, she likes to speak in riddles from time to time, it seems. You give the card back to her, and she takes it gracefully, fingers dancing over the shiny material of the card that reflects against the light, brazen with colors.

“.. I don’t see it.”

“Not yet.” Cyrene smiles all the same, it appeared as if the appeasing smile could not leave her lips.

You frown at that. Slightly, the grass shifting underneath your feet. “Am I really that ‘lovey-dovey’?”

“It’s not that,” She hums, lifting her finger to lightly press on your forehead. “Hehe, you look cute confused.”

“Then–”

“(name). You are the essence of ‘love’ itself.” Cyrene smiles – but this one doesn’t reach her eyes. She withdrew her hand away, eyes fleeting to the dawn device on Kephale’s shoulder.

“Deliverance is inevitable,” She continues, you stay quiet, in this sense. “.. I wish.. this torn-like world didn't need a deliverer, not now, not ever.”

She means █████ — .. Phainon. You could see it on her face before she could even utter your friend’s name.

Her eyes are lightly casted with a darker glint, as if – sadness? You couldn’t quite tell in time, because it was gone only seconds later.

“Cyrene?”

“Mm, but that’s not to worry, (name)! Come on, Phai’s gonna start crying for us if we leave him wandering with the faeries – memlings.” Cyrene smiles with a burgeoning of urgency, eyes lighting up again in an instant, as she gathers the card deck back into her pocket.

“Cyrene, what do you mean?” You repeat the question that danced around your head, and Cyrene stills for a moment, hands still situating the cards – she does not answer right away.

Rather, she looks up to you, a smile impeded on her lips, “Questioning a girl like this! (name), you truly are cruel ~ ♪ ”

You – despite yourself – do not push it further, only nudge into the pink-haired girl’s shoulder. “Fine.” Cyrene wouldn’t keep things from you if she wasn’t doing it for your own good, you figured.

“But you will tell me later!” You urge the taller girl, tugging at the hem of her dress from below.

⸝⸝ 𖤓𖤓𖤓

LOOP 1.

Phainon awoke to a dawn – the yellow wheat lightly shuffled below his body, his tousled snow-white hair shambling across the surface of something soft, cyan-like eyes adjusting to the weight of Kephale’s protection. It smells faint of cinnamon and baked bread – the piquancy of a welcoming arm to his awaken.

“You’re awake.” A voice ushered him woke, gentle and soft-spoken. IT whispered above his face, akin to a likening of breeze that embraced him gently, the forbearing resonance only threatened to lull the young boy asleep yet again.

Phainon stuttered open – his face a blaze of pink hue as he gathered himself, pushing his own body from your lap.

He chastised himself quietly, Don't creep her out, he chided inside his head. This is chill. You're just some friend that happened to sleep on her lap. No biggie!

His eyes locked into yours hesitantly, the silky-white tunic that adorned your body ruffled in protest as he lifted his head from it – he felt himself heating up again.

“How- how long was I asleep for?” The boy stammered upon his words, whereas you laughed at his embarrassment – the distant wind swaying ever softly beneath the bark of a leaning orange-leaved tree, the wheat-like grass flowing beneath the ground, again – almost in a rhythmic timed pattern, they swayed.

“Not long,” You shook your head, urging the white-haired boy to calm down.

“You fell asleep while I was reading the book.” You continued.

“Huh?!” Phainon stammered, sitting up to face you, your legs were folded, as his were splattered – one propped up while the other sat flat upon the fair yellowed field. “No way!”

You chuckled softly at his absolutely devastated state, you truly didn’t mind, but it would be fun to tease him so. “Were my stories that boring?”

“No!” Phainon replied in an utter panic, his hands waving around like it’d signify his innocence. “No! They’re not boring! Not at all!”

“Then why’d you fall asleep, hmm?”

“I didn’t – I mean–” he floundered, you laughed.

“I’m just teasing you.” You finally say, saving him from further embarrassment, Phainon looked quite close to pleading the fifth, or start begging for your forgiveness on his knees (like he would, he would never stoop that low, not even for you! Right?).

Phainon heaved a sigh of relief, settling himself down with an ‘oomf’ on the grassy patch next to you under the tree, body leaning over to yours, eyes not at all subtly peering at the book, you smiled at his curiosity.

“It’s a heroic story.” You whispered to him, as if unveiling a deep secret.

Phainon beamed at that – heroic epic compositions were nothing short of his favorite. He leaned in closer, cerulean cheerful eyes peeping at the book you held. “Really?!”

You nodded, a distant whirlwind pried in your words, hearing them as well. “Do you want me to read it to you?”

The boy nodded with vigor, head bumping up and down as he secured his body with 2 arms hovered over the grass, body situated to you – eager.

“So! This story,” You gestured with your hands, standing up to appear more dramatic. “Is about a hero, a soft musician.. who traverses Thanatos’ domain in a reverent search for his beloved.”

Settling the opened book onto your lap with a soft thud, the air whiffed through Aedes Elysiae gently, though ephemeral, the lasting zephyr flies past, casting its wind with a mellow stature on the two innocent figures on the yellow wheated land.

Phainon tilted his head at your summary, figure shooting up to stand. “That isn’t a hero! He doesn’t fight monsters!”

“He so is! How would you know?” You huffed at his already impatient claims, to which Phainon was only sparked by your rhetorical question.

His tone is bright, almost defensive. “A hero shines in the spotlight! He fights–” He swings his right arm in a mock-fighting motion indignantly. “–like his life depends on it!”

You laughed at that, seeing his theatrics. “Will you be a hero?”

“Yeah, obviously a hero.” He grinned, now leaning back onto the bark of the tree, propping himself up with one arm as if the very thought of saving someone didn’t weigh on him.

His white hair cascaded like a shimmering waterfall, the silver strands almost blending into the clouds above. He seemed so carefree, like the world’s concerns were just a speck on the horizon.

“.. Sounds boring.”

“It isn’t!”

“So is. ‘S just some sword swinging and a few rescuing.”

The sun – Kephale’s reverend dawn – seemed to highlight his youthful features, bringing a glow to his cheeks and a playfulness to the lines of his face.

It was almost unfair how the sun had swooned to him like a chosen one.

“So not!” Phainon piqued, his hand dashing out to reach at the sky – mock-holding Kephale’s dawn device into his thumb and index, as if he alone is holding the sun. “Cyrene told me that heroes weren’t chosen, but made. So – that path, I’ll carve it with my own hands.”

A breeze of silence fell over you both, Phainon’s promise lingering in the air like a sacred prayer for Oronyx’s benediction, one those Janus oracles would acclaim. But this is not a prophecy – nor is it a prayer, but a promise of a young boy from Aedes Elysiae.

A shudder befell your spine for some reason.

“.. You’re such an overachiever!” You laughed – the very sound reverberating around the fields of Aedes Elysiae.

You don’t think twice before leaning down to the bark of the tree as well, propping yourself next to him – the shade of the tree embracing your figures in protection.

“Whatever!” Phainon narked – bumping his shoulder into yours, delighting a yelp from you, before his attention is yet again – for some odd reason – drawn to Kephale’s dawn. “.. but I still like it better in this village.”

You blinked at his words. “Aedes Elysiae? Isn’t it kind of boring here?”

“‘S not! There’s big sis Cyrene – ma and pa, Andreas, Iraklis, Livia, everyone.” He huffed at you, finding your question utterly ridiculous. “Most importantly, there’s you!”

You try to still your face before it heats up at the last sentence – it’s a hopeless cause, you settle with the easy way of simply avoiding his gaze, looking up to Kephale’s world bearing stature, but you feel queasy looking at it as well.

“..Well, Aedes Elysiae is so isolated, though. No way you can be a hero here, you’d have to leave to – Castrum Kremnos, or something!”

Phainon paused, scratching his chin in thought. You were right. If he wanted to be a hero, no sane person would stay in a village that smirkished so far away from the large capital city-states – the polis of Kremnos is known to breed soldiers far powerful and it would definitely mold him into a strong and vigorous hero as he’d hope, or the holy city of Okhema – it would grant him the popularity that he needs, provided with a sanctuary that would safeguard him with each wants he pursues.

But leaving Aedes Elysiae seemed like a thought so far away from him.

Leaving you?

.. No.

He couldn’t fathom that.

You were just about to change the topic, nervous at his uncharacteristic silence as Phainon simply stared out into what seemed like nowhere when –

“I just won’t be a hero then!” He proudly proclaimed after a few long and arduous moments of pondering.

“Huh?!”

Phainon only shrugged at the shock on your face as you abruptly turned to face him yet again, he rested his arms beneath his head lazily, the next words drawled out in a nonchalant manner. “Well, if I had to leave Aedes Elysiae to be a hero, I don’t want to do it.”

You could only deadpan at his ironic behavior – what an oxymoron of himself, he is. “Isn’t it your dream?”

“My backup dream.” He pronounced. “My foremost dream is to just live in this village. The epics are cool and all but.. I dunno, I like the tranquility here more. I have everything I want, why would I leave?”

That gives you pause – he had a point, you supposed. A strange one, but a point nevertheless.

“You’re weird.”

“Hey!” Phainon bumped his shoulder into yours at that.

You laughed. “What? I’m just saying!”

“What’s so weird ‘bout just staying here?” Phainon pouted, looking at the ridges of golden reeds painting across Aedes Elysiae.

People busied about, carrying buckets of milk, or stacks of hay into their arms, cows, or horses followed suite – it’s idyllic, even with the bustling of the streets.

“.. I like it home the most.” Phainon smiled to himself.

You go silent at his melancholic words – he speaks as if he’s leaving, as if he’s gone, but he’s not.

“.. I guess so. But compared to being a hero, wouldn’t like.. Say, managing a farm be plenty mundane?”

“Well, the chickens are similar enough to the vigorous titankins in the hymns, right?” Phainon snickered, recounting the multitude of embarrassing ways he had to chase his father’s hoard of chicken down the wheat field. “Oh! And you’re like the final boss that chases me down the–”

You quickly smack the back of his head at the underhand jab. “I do not.”

“Ow! See? Just like a hero being beat up by his archnemesis.” He whined, holding his head in a theatrical manner.

“I am not an archnemesis!”

“Really? What role do you propose, then?”

You hummed, a finger dusting your chin in thought, before announcing: “Ah.. oh, I got it – the antihero!”

.. okay, yeah, that was kind of stupid. You turn to Phainon as he only stared at you with an incredulous look on his face at your proclamation. An ‘anti-hero’?! That was literally just another way of saying ‘anti-phainon’!

“What?!” Phainon yelped, pressing himself closer to you by anchoring himself with both arms on the grass, face sticking into your personal space. “That’s like – the total opposite of my role!”

“I mean! Isn’t antihero a cool title?” You quickly try to explain to the mortified male in front of you. “Cyrene told me about it.”

“But.. but – that’s so different from a hero! Don’t you want to be like a .. damsel in distress? Or, or.. sidekick? Or–”

“No way!” You pouted, and Phainon immediately sulked at your answer. “Damsel in distress is so boring, why can’t I just save myself? Sidekick is kinda generic.”

You paused, before relaxing your shoulders against the bark of the tree, whilst Phainon looked all but relaxed, your gaze swims to the cerulean sky.

“But.. What I like about the antihero is that they’re really ambiguous. Like, I don’t wanna be a hero, it’s too much responsibility. But villains are mean guys, so they’re inherently bad – but they also do things for a reason. So an anti-hero is something in between that line of good and bad, they’re neither morally righteous or immoral.” You paused. Your words are strange to your voice, it’s strangely mature. Your gaze lifts from the sky back to Phainon.

“But they’re.. not conventionally heroic. For that reason I like it, it’s flawed – it’s really human.”

At your philosophical soliloquy, Phainon only whined, throwing an arm over your shoulder in a manner of boredom – your words go in one ear and out the other for the white-haired boy, it seemed. “You’re starting to sound wayyy too smart! Stop hanging out with Cyrene so much!”

“What, jealous?” You teased, feeling his arm around your shoulder drawing you closer to him. “Cyrene likes me more, after all.”

“No way! Cyrene’s been my friend longer – she obviously likes me more!” He pinched your arm cheekily.

You yelped, quickly pinching him back. “By theory, sure, but Cyrene likes me a teensy winsey more. She told me!”

“Did not.”

You scoffed at his words. “Did too.”

He punches – playfully so, there is no strength, as if he could not hurt even a bit of you – your shoulder lightly aches again, whereas you punch him back, then he pinches your cheek, you dart to pinch his (much harder).

This devolves into him kicking your feet with his, and your kicking his stomach – Phainon flew to tackle you onto the ground, his form casting a shadow over yours, his hands darting to your wrist to pin them above your head.

“Ha! The hero always wins, didn’t the epics teach ya that, (name)?” He grinned, white teeth and all.

You scoffed, squirming and kicking. “You’re not even a hero – you’re a bully!”

Phainon lets out a scandalized gasp, his hold on your hands loosening at the offensive remark. “No way! I’m –”

You take the opportunity to yank your hand out of his hold, and fingers itch a rapid line to tickle at his waist – to which the white haired boy immediately starts squirming, trying, and failing, to swat you away.

“Haha–! (name)! Stop, I can’t–!” He wheezed, your fingers flying around his waist, Phainon looks no less than the textbook definition of pathetic rather than a so-called hero.

“Yield.” Your fingers do not attempt to stop their assault.

“Yield! Yield! I yield!”

You, in your merciful inclination, released your fingers from his sides, satisfied at his beseeching of a failure.

You grin to yourself as Phainon catches his breath – having looked like he had undergone a traumatic event.

“.. You really are an anti-phainon.”

“What was that?”

“You heard that, don’t even pretend!”

You laughed, stomach riling with your senses.

The sky fights back, casting now a saffron hue over your figures, the two of you dancing in a frolic of your own.

The book in your hands prior rests unnoticed now – but the pages are flipped through by the soft caress of wind, shifting through its pages, as if a story was woven out into the air right then.

You and Phainon’s innocent aligned figures sat atop the hill, near that familiar bark of a tree that hung over your stature.

Cyrene watches from a distance with a smile, before turning her gaze away from your childish menageries, huffing a giggle into her open hand that rested over her mouth, a stack of hay situated in her arms as she maneuvered around with the graze of a butterfly.

…

The stone slate features two figures. Erected onto a capacious wall – inscribed with cracks of gold. The slate is rough, grazing one’s hand would sure to injure.

Ἀεὶ κολοιὸς παρὰ κολοιῷ ἱζάνει.

The large transcriptions read –

"A jackdaw is always found near a jackdaw". What a strange title.

The large stone slate depicts this: one a hero, plastered onto rock transcriptions roughly – prominently, ichor flowing with resplendent aureate of veins – amalgamated with the Titan’s own cycles of eternal punishment – of sins incipient by sheep born of cattle, by flames of humanity reaved by the seeker of truth, the figure is nothing short of divine.

Small hoards of sheep gather near the scintillating figure.

.. The sheep is sat at 42° angle clockwise.

The other a mortal, a nebulous existence in contrary to the other of gleaming epics – one of hazy transcriptions, barely indented onto the plastered rocks of time, not once has their ichor touched a hint of chrysos, not once, has their soul drifted to the light, crawling out of the darkness through volition of their own – it is a weak soul.

A crow – or a jackdaw lingers near the brotós, mortal.

The jackdaw loiters at a 13° angle counter-clockwise.

–Weak, as the mortal may appear, the soul of the divine will always be fallible to the coalition of the human soul – no matter how hard, how insistent the divine is, the holy holds no sway over the human soul. For humans wield what the beatific and holiest cannot, for that is the finity of life in itself.

But mark my words, O mortal born of folly. For the divinity will stain the cleaves of your hands as do a pomegranate, stick to the roof of your teeth as the seeds pop, the holy will take your soul and cleave it into something burgundy and substandard.

For this, you will refuse anything but the greed to reach your anthropoid fingers to it again, greedy human instincts to attempt clutch at even the holy. But the divine shall crawl its way beneath your crimson-aligned veins and fuel you into itself, and the divine will never leave quietly, especially when you, foolish one, ask for it.

It is like fire. He is like fire.

And you? You will burn as incendiary martyrs will.

The two of you laugh, Phainon’s face beaming at the story’s content, face puffing the slightest larger as you guide your way through the story, expressions painting each scene as you laugh along to the far-chronicle.

The flames of your souls dance along – perhaps too eagerly interlaced.

.. ah. ‘A jackdaw is always found near a jackdaw’ – that is true, for ‘birds of a feather will flock together’, would they not?

⸝⸝ 𖤓𖤓𖤓

Letter 1.

M̶y̶ ̶d̶e̶a̶r̶ ̶f̶r̶i̶e̶n̶d̶,̶ M̶y̶ ̶b̶e̶l̶o̶v̶e̶d̶

M̶y̶ ̶d̶e̶a̶r̶e̶s̶t̶,̶ ̶(̶n̶a̶m̶e̶)̶,̶

(.. certain letters at the top were crossed out in a rush. It looks messy, had it not been for small little hearts, sun, and star constellations that were drawn deftly across the brown-stained paper.)

My dear (name),

Forgive my awful handwriting – though in cruelly I wish nothing but the best for your eyes to ponder. I hope.. Pray, to hand you these letters myself s̶o̶m̶e̶ one day, and this will be the starting mark of it! You told me prior to today, sitting under that same flaxen tree behind my grandparent’s quite candidly rotting house that you liked handwritten letters, your face lightly brazen with the intricacies of the daybreak and that saccharine dawn-kissed smile i̶ ̶w̶i̶s̶h̶ ̶f̶o̶r̶ ̶n̶o̶t̶h̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶m̶o̶r̶e̶ ̶i̶n̶ ̶t̶h̶a̶t̶ ̶m̶o̶m̶e̶n̶t̶ ̶t̶h̶a̶t̶ ̶i̶ ̶w̶a̶s̶ ̶K̶e̶p̶h̶a̶l̶e̶'̶s̶ ̶d̶a̶w̶n̶ ̶d̶e̶v̶i̶c̶e̶ on your face prompted me an idea I could not push down as I do the rest. So, these letters will be my stalemates to you, dear (name).

Now, sitting under the horribly lit oil lamp of my room, the light is frightfully flicking with trepidation in my face – surely I will get rid of this soon. Nevertheless, the point is that I am not sure where to start, for you have too much traits that I could ponder to myself over this crooked bedside table about for eternity and not get bored. It’s weird – my mind conjures all these thoughts when my eyes meet each curve of your face, happy or sad – sleepy or awake, but now, sitting here like this, it’s much harder to form the adequate words I believe you deserve. Nevermind that, I’m sure I could tell you this in person later, or in another letter, frankly, whichever you prefer, I’d do it.

But foremost, my first letter shall be a profound of a love letter. Yes, cliche, isn’t it? Oh, I’m sure you’d bend over your stomach laughing your pretty face out had you heard me utter such uncharacteristic words – but yes, if my first letter for you is about something, let it be about love that drew us woven.

(name)–‎ █████#̷̪̪̥͚̂̋#̴̨͖̖͔̲̬̍̀͑̃͂̑̽̑#̸̢̧͈̝̝̱̏̋#̶̨̛̮̖̤͓͈̘̐̀̍̀̀͊̚#̴̠͍̞̳͆͛̆̍͊̑́̉͘…

(big sis Cyrene helped Phai write this~! (๑>◡<๑) hehe)

y̴̞͎͌͐͐̊o̵͈͊̐͋͛̓͂̃ṵ̶̰͚̪͈̱̊̄̌r̵̡̻̳̰̖̉̐̊͌͋͋̓̐̀s̵̡̱̹̙̪̦͖̯̝̐̊̓̒͌͜ ̵̞̝͙̮̆̇͗̔̌̄͝f̵͓̘͍̮̝̥̙̱̈́̆̇̓̍̂̈́͝ǫ̴̯͇̲̯̫̙̞̯̘̕r̸̛̬̻̙̹͇̲̆̈́̓̅̈́͐̎ͅe̵̛̻̝̟̭̍̃́͜v̷̛̛̤͈͕̊̂̅̃͛̓̕e̶̯͒̌͑͝r̷̲̮̭̯͓͌̽̂͜,̴̱̺̞͙̅͌ ̴̟̱̩͈̼̬̼̣̓͗͐̈́͗̓̓͜K̵̨̢̧̤̪̠͚͚̝̮̓̃͐̏̀́͌h̴̨̚ȁ̴̻̜̺͈͍̿͂̀͒s̸̡̑l̴̼̩̱̟̺͇̝͇͍̉ͅa̸̤͍̯̞̐̑͐̕̚n̴̪̩͙͉͕̭̩̬͔͑̀̌̔̏̐̕͠ͅȧ̵̬͚̜͕̮͈̩̹͊͘͜͝͝….

(... Cyrene’s postscript note stays intact in the middle of the torn letter, the rest are burnt, crippling into darker edges on the sides – taunting. You do not know what the rest say.)

⸝⸝ 𖤓𖤓𖤓

The fields of Aedes Elysiae were unchanging – for that was the one prominence that Phainon loved most in his home.

Unchanging, undeterred. The fields mewed a soft zephyr, the breeze grazed one’s forehead the same as do outsiders or homeward citizens, the distinction in power hierarchy doesn’t touch the people of his village, no.

There are no kings – ones closer to that role were the village chiefs, but the power they wield weren’t all-powerful, nor was it overwhelming, it was safe. Secured, and sure, they’d grab Phainon by the scruff of his shirt sometimes with stolen cabbages in his arms, but the village chief – the old man, with legs that worked for only farming and eyes that need not open fully – would only scoff, before roughly ruffling the bands of his snow white hair and urged him off with a scowl, arms still cladded with the (stolen – given, now, he supposed) cabbages.

There are no lows – when neighbors struggled with harsh weather, or crops refused to grow so, people would gather support, handing them a portion of the season’s harvest with a smile, or gather a fire pit into the town’s center, and everyone – most of all the adults, in the least – would clink glasses and tell mythical stories to the children that sat abide like passing the hay to the horses to eat, it’s simple as love among everyone equally that brewed him his own.

There are no arguments – at least ones that lasted, or escalated. Disputes in the village happen – of course they do, they are foremost emotions. Despite that, Phainon found that while sadness, anger, bitterness is always consciously present here, it is temporary as it comes, because when a fight would break out, the village chief would intervene with the same bored look old people tended to have and shake each party’s hands into a peace treaty somehow, then it’d go back to normal – happy, content. Anger never lasted, for it was only the storm that followed suite with a rainbow gaze.

There are no conflicts – no war, no battle royals to the death like Castrum Kremnos, within constant isolation like Aidonia, accoutred with rogues as Dolos, complicated in reason as the Grove of Epiphany, or large and garbed with a population larger than Phainon could comprehend like Okhema city resided – Aedes Elysiae is gentle, it is soft – unfettered by events that did not garner them, unaffected by the state of the larger polis, it was small, and it was all Phainon needed.

Really, Aedes Elysiae was the only place he ever fettered to, he ever wanted to be in.

The birds chirp with a cheery tune loudly here, they’re happily singing, diving through the flaxen fields with practical ease. His work is easy, gathering crops, harvesting rice plant panicles, red soil feeds, or even chasing those pesky chickens down the fields again – his work is facile, and Phainon likes it as it is.

Aedes Elysiae has Cyrene – his older friend, who looked like she held the world in her hands. She wasn’t much older, no, but Cyrene looked, talked, and seemed as if she held all knowledge more mature than adults of the village, her voice shimmered with a calm radiance, her pink hair fluttered with the wind’s bygones, and she knew everything–!

Cards, divination, books of high caliber, theatre plays with complicated vocabularies, all of it! She’d nod along to him on her lap going off about heroes, read stories to you and him for long as the two of you had begged for, sneaked the two of you snacks when she wasn’t supposed to, she was the bestest of best.

Aedes Elysiae was home to his parents, who meticulously built that roof to place him under – they were the best! They’d adore him with all that they could, pamper him with the best porridges, dishes and love, usher him into their bed when he’d cried over a scary, large monster encapsulating the village and drawing large body of crimson rivers – they’d wiped away the tears on his cheeks and buried him between their arms under the blanket, stuffy hot as the weather was, the warmth of their embrace was all that felt right. His father, Hieronymus was the strongest to Phainon, with arms that could lift both him and Cyrene up with ease, arms that carried him and you out of the kindergarten crying about nonsensical monsters. His father was strong. He could carry the heaviest boulders – Phainon wonders if one day, he could too.

His mother – Audata, was the kindest, most amazing woman he ever knew. She’d greet him gently, ruffle his hair while stuffing his mouth with nothing but delicacies. She’d embrace him after each school-day, carding her fingers around his snow-flaked hair with a soft, delicate, humming as he fell asleep.

She’d force him down and cut his hair when it grew too long for comfort, even as his hair flailed onto the floor like specks of snow, his mother would clean it up without complaint, and usher him another smile. His mother never complained. She was the most gentle woman ever.

And most importantly – most significantly, Aedes Elysiae has you.

You, with the soft smile, you, with the gentle jabs, you, with that sweet, gods – sweet, saccharine-like voice.

He’d always been the type to like sugar, sweets encircled with sugar made him jump with joy (and later with sugar rush) – you were just like sugar. Rough around the edges – you’ve chased him down more than he can count – but sweet to the core.

He could imagine himself standing in Aedes Elysiae, but he couldn’t imagine it happy without you.

The softest laugh, the kindest eyes, the most burrowed of gentleness that clawed into his chest and dug itself a space in the hollow of his heart, and him, who sewed it closed so the gentleness would not leave. You were constant – unchanging, almost like an immovable object.

He’d wake up, jog to your house and climb through your window with it purposefully left unlocked by courtesy of your doing, wake you up with a grin, to which you’d throw a pillow straight to his face, and the two of you would spend the rest of the day with tasks smaller than the world would know.

You were perpetual, you didn’t change, didn’t move, didn’t – grow, in a way.

He could walk through the most horrid of hells, and turn to his side and you’d be the constant with him.

He liked that the most. Liked how you wouldn’t leave, even if you two fought, either he or you would come to the other with teary eyes.

Even if you two didn’t agree – you’d bicker for a few minutes, then he’d nudge closer to you and say that he liked whatever you liked, your face would flush the cute red he liked, and smack him in the face.

The gentle you, the quiet you, the loud you – each of it was unchanging. Sweet, beautiful you, who’d gaze at the stars and pry, shake his arms for him to look, even if the stars – far away as they were – were in human form in front of him.

So in touch, so prominent, so .. real.

He could hide from everything, from everyone – duck under a tree, beneath the bed or hide from himself, but he could not, would not hide from you.

Real, touchable, tangible, immovable – his other half.

“Psst, what are you exploding your mind thinking about?” A cold sensation to his cheek made him jerk back – to see you, holding a can of drink to his face, a teasing smile on your own as you threw the drink to him.

He caught the can with one hand mindlessly, flicking it open with a playful scoff at your arrival. “Nothing. And even if I was, I’ll have you know, it’s a genius mind in action.”

“Oh yeah, I’m sure.” You hummed sarcastically, standing next to him, flicking open your own can of drink, the fizzy sound reverberates. “No really, what are you thinking about? You look perpetually deep in thought, it’s creeping me out.”

“Is it so weird that I’m deep in thought?”

“Yeah, you’re never thinking.”

He kicked your leg from the back of your knee, to which you only stumble forward with a laugh.

“.. I’m thinking about Aedes Elysiae,” He answered after a moment of silence, you sipping your drink in expectation, a brow raised, urging him to continue. “Of.. home, I guess. Is that weird?”

–Of course, Phainon tells you anyway, it’s not like he can deny you.

He can try to tell himself he won’t tell you but he turns out to either way – his thoughts are yours, it’s a routine simple as breathing.

You quirked an eyebrow at his words. “Kind of. What, you planning on leaving?”

“No! No, no – I mean, I’m just.. Rethinking a lot of things, to be honest.” His hands sheepishly caught the back of his neck, scratching it thoughtlessly, his free hand fidgets with the can in his hand. “I have this weird urge to.”

Phainon’s said weird too much by this point – he is kind of weird with all of this, where did it even come from, this urge?

A bile rises up from his trachea, blocking his airways, and consecutively extends to his thoughts. “Am I weird?”

You paused, looking at your drink – mouth just a slight away from the opening of the can. You turn to him, an unreadable look in your face. “.. Sure. But so what? Everybody’s weird.”

He narrowed his eyes at your words – it’s not really comforting. “You know that’s not what I meant.” He pouted against the mouth of his drink, lips pursing against each other.

If he’s weird, you’d leave, you’d run away, claw yourself out of his chest through the weaves he sewed and flee with a tail between your leg from his weird –

“I like you being weird,” Your hand is on his head now, fingers in the middle of the snowy landscape of his hair – Phainon stills, like a dog would. “Say it over and over. Your weird thoughts, your weird food cravings, random weird melancholic homesickness even if you’re at home.”

He unconsciously leaned into your touch, eyes lidding close, the drink almost forgotten as he focused on the hand – your hand, uncalloused, soft on his head. “.. doesn’t that make you weird?”

“I never said I wasn’t.”

Phainon laughed a hitch at that, a low sound from his chest, it almost made you shiver. “So we’re both weirdos?”

You smiled at him, one that sang what couldn’t from your throat, one that spoke of utter reassurance, one that he wanted to staple onto you for eternity – one that held his heart, one that he handed his heart to.

“We are.” You’d retracted your hand from his head, and he could feel himself sulking over the loss of contact, fingers twitching to grab your wrist himself and card your fingers back into his hair by force.

Phainon moved closer to you, and without a word, rested his head on your shoulder thoughtlessly, his hair tickling your neck. “.. I miss home.”

“Yeah?” You two were home. What a weird thing to say.. How sweetly sorrowful – this weird, aching feeling that derived from your stomach when he said it, as if you felt it as well.

You two were weird.

Like .. an even odd, a wise fool, a brawling love, a loving hate, that waking sleep that burns teeth into the cravings of inedible flesh, that fire that lights at water – aching for the pain, relishing in being relinquished. That heavy lightness, that pungent bitter sweetness –

How weird you were.

How weird he was.

How weird, that even with that – you hold him still.

How weird, that he looks at you like you were meant to stay, fire in his eyes that gleamed when you left, even if it’s to go home for the night – fire in his eyes when you’d stayed, and the weird, burning desire that cascaded in him, buried into his instincts to make you stay, keep staying, and always stay.

It burns at him, not the burn that was bad, not the burns that radiated to his epidermis and blisters a harsh red when he stuck his hand in the fire recklessly, no – it’s the burn that made him crave for it. The burn that fired in his heart, then his skin, tickling it with utmost sincerity, it makes him want to reach his greedy fingers out and scratch it – the burn.

How weird.

“.. Stay, (name).”

It’s not a request, doesn’t sound like one. More like a demand, it’s finalized in Phainon’s words.

You blinked at his words, the drinks you brought for the both of you forgotten, his voice muffled into your neck, arms around your waist tightly as you held him.

He’d said it so quietly, almost like he didn’t want you to hear it, almost like you were privy to a thought he’d let run through his fingers and slip through his mouth.

You hear it anyways, and you answer – you always will, you could not bear to not answer him.

“I’m not leaving.”

How weird – it almost felt like you were lying to him.

“.. Hey, (name)?”

“Hm?”

“.. Those birds, salt and pepper.” Phainon started, mouth moving against your neck.

You huffed at the old memory. “You mean the birds that we tried to save?”

“Yeah,” He said, a melancholic tone noted in his voice. “Do you think–”

Salt and Pepper – much strange names they were, real creative of the two of you – were two birds that you and Phainon found lying desecrated on the ground, both huffing for life, fighting for what remains of the fire in their small bird heart.

Even something so small has to fight, not always because they want to – far from it, but because fate orders them to.

You two tried – as much as two little kids could, anyway – to save them, but as do all wild animals that had been hunted down, it was to an extent, of no avail.

Salt was a white bird with textured fringes, as the name suggested. It was an active bird, no doubt.

Pepper was a stygian, much smaller bird – quieter, and the first one to die.

You had been there the whole time, while Salt flew around in joyous momentum, its wings bandaged by scraps of gauzes that Phainon could dig out, Pepper’s wings only fluttered a weak beat, its peck unmoving, not a single sound was drawn out of the black bird – its wings, which should be so open, free – only drooped further down, the edges frayed and ragged.

Phainon had offered Pepper some worms – hands dirtied as he nudged the worms to Pepper’s mouth, following a fruitless action.

When Pepper no longer responded, when its breathing was no longer viable, not even once as you poked its wings, not even once as Phainon blew some air into it – the bird didn’t move, its wings spread open as it took its last breath in your hand.

Salt, the white bird, seeing this – seemed like it didn’t understand, and instead flocked its wings around Pepper’s dead body, as if waiting for the black bird to rise up again, fluttering around with quickened activity.

The two of you had cried with the bird alternating between your hands and Phainon’s until late that evening, where Cyrene came home with obvious shock on her face as she took in the sight of your snot-covered faces and a dead bird on your palm.

She’d have calmed the two of you down, and pried the bird–Pepper’s stygian body away to bury in the soil of Phainon’s front yard – whereas the white bird, Salt, was released back into the wild, with you and Phainon waving it a happy goodbye.

Pepper was laid to an early death – you can’t help thinking that it could’ve survived, but pushed the thought down. Salt was free, it’d live through the worst and flung its wings to bare the sky with glee–

– A few days later, you’d found Salt lying a defaced mess, no doubt hunted by an apex predator in the same yard that Pepper laid buried – you didn’t tell Phainon this.

How could you bear to? To tell him that the one bird that sought freedom fell to the same fate as if it had just given up – to tell him the white bird, who’d made it out alive, had been treated not an ounce kinder when it touched freedom – you couldn’t say that.

So instead, you quietly buried Salt’s white, desecrated body near Pepper’s own grave in Phainon’s front yard – Cyrene looked at you with slight pity in her eyes as you dug a grave for the white bird.

. . .

“.. Do you think that Pepper could have made it out?” You finished the thought for Phainon, to which he doesn’t respond for a heartbeat.

You take his silence as a nudge to continue. “.. Would it have been better for Pepper to make it out?”

You think back to Salt’s dead, cold body, though its eyes were glazed with freedom, baring its wings to the sky, only to be victim to a glass wall of a matter of equality in cycles.

Everything was in this strange triangular hierarchy, you noticed.

“It would’ve been, right?” Phainon replied, eyes a darker shade – fear, almost. “(name), it would’ve been, right?”

You flinched at his words, your eyes flickering away from his to find a semblance of guilt in the yellow reeds in front of you. “Maybe for Pepper.. It was better for it to – die first.”

“What?” You could feel Phainon’s stare as he lifted his head from the crook of your neck, his arms around your waist loosening as if he couldn’t believe your words – not a bit of it.

How was it better to die? How was it easier to kill yourself instead of fight–

“It looked peaceful, didn’t it?” You recalled the black bird with its wings open, its last breath taken on your palm.

Dead, and defiled as it looked, when your eyes wandered to its tiny face, all you could find was a serene expression – peace, fleeting as it was.

You felt your spine grow cold at the thought.

“That’s not true.” Replied the white-haired boy, hands moving from your waist to grasp at your shoulder, almost adamant to make you believe. “That isn’t true. It can’t be easier to die than live.”

You clasped a hand over his. “Sometimes,” Your voice is quieter, serene-like, the voice like a mother would. “It’s harder to live than to just die.”

Maybe that’s how Pepper felt, you bitterly thought.

For Salt – the pallid bird who freed itself with wings spread ajar, freedom at the touch of its feathers – even that burning scalding freedom got it nowhere but a route’s dead end.

But for Pepper – that dusk colored bird whom seeked none but a death of their own, you can’t help but think–

A better fate was it, to die on one’s own volition than even fight to live and die as fate intends.

“Don’t say that.” Phainon’s voice is clipped when he shakes you back to reality. “Don’t say it like you’re considering it too.”

“What?” You couldn’t help but huff a small laughter. “I’m not, don’t be silly.”

“You sound like you are.”

Did you? You didn’t notice yourself.

“You’re worrying too much,” You lead his face back into the crook of your neck by a steady hand behind his head, breath shimmering down your collarbone deftly – lest he finds it in himself to overthink another matter. “Just a comparison. Besides, we’re all gonna die of old age in a village separated as this, what are you worrying for?”

“.. I guess you’re right.” Phainon muttered into your neck, the sound a low vibration as he felt your heart beneath the aching of his chest, your bodies fitted – ovetailed against one another with seamless difficulty, it felt like he was trying to consume your body into his own.

Your heart beats – a thump – another thump.

Repetitive.

The same sound again and again – so human, so alive. Phainon pressed himself further onto you.

“Phainon.”

“Don’t leave, (name).”

The words were whispered as though they were worship of prayers hidden among depths of simply skin and skin over and over again – among the ichor, crimson or gold – he tore the words out of his chest like a voiceless prayer.

You responded to him in kind. “.. I won’t leave.”

“Say it again.”

“I won’t leave.”

“Again.”

“I won’t leave.”

“One more time–”

You grasped his head with two hands cupping his cheek, forcing him to look you in the eyes. “Phainon. I told you, I’m not leaving.”

“Swear it. Swear it the way we always do.”

Phainon nudged you with a tightened grip of your shoulder – he means the silly method of promise the two of you made every time you swore to each other something.

Nothing ceremonious, or grandiose – just a routine that was so painfully, utterly yours and his.

“Cross my heart,” You withdrew your hands from his face, drawing a line from the right of your shoulder to your left, crossing the line over the bridge of your heart, thumping insistently in your chest. “And be torn into the sunrise,”

‘And be torn into the sunrise’ – an extra verse the two of you had made and added yourself – it was a running joke, since Kephale’s dawn was always up, so prominent from the fields of Aedes Elysiae, it meant everyday, each minute, was sunrise.

Therefore, (in Phainon’s words, anyway) anything that is sworn within the oath will always be true, torn into the skies themselves, forever.

You continued, looking into his eyes. “I’ll stay with you. Swear it.”

You will. For as long as he allowed you to.

“.. Swear it.”

He needed you to.

⸝⸝ 𖤓𖤓𖤓

Letter 4.

Dear my beloved (name),

These letters are starting to feel more like journaling than letters, but that’s fine. It just means I have a lot to tell you! That’s besides the point – (name), I’ve been wracking my brain over just what ‘love’ means. I asked Cyrene, and she said love is gentle – like the stories of heroes, or the wracking tragedy of a love fallen or just a cool fight scene, not that it made sense to me at that time. How can love be ‘something’ like ‘gentle’ and ‘tragic’? Love is simply romantic, right? Like those.. Kissing stuff, I tried to pry Cyrene for more ‘words of wisdom’ but she only peered me away and told me that I’d get it someday – I doubt that. So I asked my Ma and Pa, where they said love is strong – do people’s definition of love just get more confusing as I keep asking along? How is love even strong? I bet I can beat it in an arm wrestling battle – it’s just a feeling, isn’t it? Ahh, I’m being all weird again with these questions, but the reason I asked was because I couldn’t define what love meant to me, to us. Is it weird? (Sorry, I keep asking that nowadays) Is it weird to not understand love when I see it each day?

I think, to me, love is the way your eyes light against the dawn of the sky when you turn to me, your hair subsequently darts against the softest zephyr that was sent to greet you, the way your voice shimmers, a clearer emergence in seas of discordant sounds and endless stars in which you, yet again, still shine the brightest – like you were born for it.

Maybe it’s okay if I don’t have a definition of love – no one technically has to, right?

Sometimes I suspect you were made from the same core as stars were, hahah. I only ever memorized one constellation (much to Cyrene’s dislike, you know she kept trying to teach me?), and it was because it reminded me so vertuably of you. It’s called the Lyra! Something-something falling hawk (or eagle, actually - was that the same thing?), but that’s besides the point. It has this star named Vega inside, and it’s one of the brightest stars ever to map the night sky – I think that’s just like you. The brightest of souls, the most resplendent and shining of hearts in a map of stars.

Also, it has a lyre, kind of like the lullabies you often sang to me, so it’s just like you! Hence why I like the constellation so much. Imagine how much I could learn if all the studies were done about you!

(name), you say such philosophical things all that time that I can’t help but wonder – if I, and only I, could take a peek inside that brain of yours and see for myself how you think – would that bear us closer? If you’d let me look inside of you?

Oh, I’ve got it!

My definition of love: is you!

I still don’t really get it, but when adults speak of those thumping in your chest, the weird stomach worms wiggling around, or when your head gets all fuzzy and weird – that’s supposed to be love, right?

Weird, though, I think it feels just like when I start to get sick or overloaded on sugar – is that reallllyyy love?

But I guess, the difference is that the strange impeccable feeling from love brings me more joy than I can simply put to words – and this strange feeling only derives from you. So, in a short, easy, Phainon definition, love is you, (name)!

Still kind of confused, but I think with this definition, I won’t have to pry Cyrene any longer than I already have.

Anyway! I hope you won’t find this letter specifically, I think it’s a little embarrassing since this is all just me needlessly ranting about how much I see you in even maps of stars in the sky or the strange strange pit inside of my stomach that seems to scream for you – please don’t tease me later!!

Forever yours, Phainon ~

(This letter remains uninjured and undeterred by ragged edges as do the other letters, it’s full and crisp – like a new letter written just minutes ago. If not for the circumstances, you could laugh at the doodles he had placed – how sweet.)

⸝⸝ 𖤓𖤓𖤓

The dawn of Kephale shimmers beneath the touch of your eyes, you close them, appalled by the brightness of it – the reeds fight against the weight of your back above the golden field, your arms reach out, trying, and failing, to block the blazing light of the dawn.

Your arm falls back impatiently to your side, the brightness unrelenting against your closed eyelids.

Here, under this stupid, same tree – you could pretend time stilled for even a moment of your own interest. You could heave your breath in and believe that the world stays as it is.

You could pretend you weren’t growing up.

The reeds move again with the deliverance of the soft zephyr, mocking your own thoughts. You scoff at it.

Time was a monster.

A monster who would swallow up his children – or raise the heavens against humanity, or impede the nature of mortality.

Time was unfair.

An unfair reality that – even if you wish, even if you beg, even if you try and try to grab it into your palms – things will change.

You could claw at it with your might, scream till your throat was hoarse and beg for a time reimburse, but in its unfair nature, time will not respond.

Time hitches, time stutters, time challenges, time –

Does not wait.

What are you searching for?

You give pause, and you’re almost keen on saying ‘only time will tell’, but Oronyx, Time, remains quiet against you, what cruel titan.

Everything runs out of time. IT is what fate precedes – it is predetermined. This, cruel, but real knowledge makes your inside squirm in relentless questioning.

The walls of your house wear down, sticking with scratches that pierces into the deeper layers, chipping away at the paint. Even something upstanding as your home runs on borrowed time.

The trees around Aedes Elysiae don't stand forever. It was planted – rooted to live, but is cut down in favor of materials for casting fire. The crops – the reeds, golden, bright, as they are, they get cut off, harvested, they end.

The animals, too. The farms in Aedes Elysiae nurture the pigs, feed the chickens and foster the horses, but when time arrives, the grown-ups carry their near-dead bodies and take them for harvest, as food. Animals have an end – like those stygian and pallid birds.

The scarecrows come to ruin by time as well. They too, aren’t spared from the blizzards of the wind, nor the harsh storms of the titans’ sorrows. The mannequin wears down by little, the clothes dirty and the birds chip away at the ‘human-like protector’. You wince.

Everything is preceded, predetermined, planned – everything has a clear beginning, a clear, fated end that befits their stature.

You know things end. You know it too well. Your mother who’d claw at your skin, begging to live, shaking your shoulder as if you were the fates that ordained her ill nature.

She’d flung the medicine to the floor, clenched her nails into the pillow hard enough for it to gain scratch marks – and lacerated you when the life last left her, and all that flung out of her mouth weren’t a sentimental last word but string of curses – at the gods, at you.

Your mother was a good woman.

Then, she’d left with a declaration that took the last of her strength with her: ‘Let this child be cursed – for time takes all!’

Unstable, unkind to you – but good. You want to believe so.

The world had been unkind to her, and she needed something to be unkind to.

So what if that was you?

Could you blame her?

Once twitching, once yelling, her kind, good body, fell limp in the total silence of your breath.

You stared at her body on the bed for hours.

You feel an itching need to be unkind to someone else. Something. Anything.

You feel an itching need to throw your fist into flesh, draw your nails into skin until it drives blood–

Until a familiar figure pressed his palm into your shoulder. The touch is grounding.

Until those azure eyes flew with concern over your tear-stricken face, and pressed you into the crook of his shoulder wordlessly, allowing himself to sink onto the floor as well you, sobs wrecking into the material of his blue tunic.

Time takes all.

Time is unkind.

But you don’t want it to take him.

And you will not allow it to be unkind to him.

Your hands braced behind his shoulder, as if you needed to plant him closer to you, until each atom in your bodies were magnetized to the other, until he was woefully you, as you were him.

Sobs had wrack through your chest, then, and he didn’t say anything, didn’t need to. His hands just held you tighter to him.

Time takes all.

But you pray, if there’s a single titan out there that listens – be it Mnestia or the unanswering Oronyx – let him be the sole thing not be taken by time.

You would beg if need be.

They don’t need to answer, you don’t want to hear them. They just needed to keep him alive, that’s all you ever cared for.

His long, calloused fingers – probably dirtied by the mud from busying the horses into the den – carded through your hair, softly wracking its way through your unruly, unkempt locks.

You claw at his clothes again, your fingers raked into the cotton of his shirt roughly.

"Look at me". He had whispered, his mud fingers moving to your face, turning it to him. "Look only at me."

It’s not as if you could bear to look at anything but him. His eyes burn into yours, so clear, even with tears blurring at your eyelids. The flecks of gold in his blue eyes shined brighter when he was so close.

Time takes all.

You wished it would not take this moment from you, even if your body was rotten into the soils of the earth, becoming one with the planted seeds of the dirt. You wished he would stay forever, whether in memories or otherwise.

You wish, wish, and wish.

But time blurs all, even memories.

“Hey, wake up.”

You awake blearily to a grinning face, Phainon’s figure above you blocking the sun.

You glared at his cheshire cat-like smirk, all content with waking you up from your comforting nap under the flaxen tree. He moves to stumble himself down beside you before you could kick him where the sun doesn’t shine.

“What’re you dreaming about?” Phainon observed as you sat up, stretching your arms over your head at the strain of lying under the tree, you huffed at his arrival.

“My ma. The past.”

His eyes narrowed at your response. “-- Well stop thinking ‘bout your Ma. I didn’t even like ‘er, totally sucked.”

“Hey!”

“What? It’s the truth! She was mean to you.”

You rolled your eyes at his words. “She wasn’t ‘mean’, she was tired and sick.”

“Yeah? Well when I’m sick, I don’t throw plates at you.”

“She had anger issues.”

“She had a lot of issues.”

You punch Phainon square in the shoulder, he only yelped, rubbing against the spot where you had aggressively offended him. “She was my Ma.”

“My Ma doesn’t act like yours,” He recalled – the vast difference between your family and his. “Moms are supposed to love and adore their kids in any circumstance, not scream and try to fist fight them. And no, being sick isn’t a valid excuse.”

You scoffed at him again, crossing your arms deftly over your chest. “.. Whatever! She –” Your mind races for an excuse, a justification – nothing comes up but her distraught face, the words ‘time takes all’ swimming around.

“You don’t owe her anything.” Phainon, as if sensing your discomfort, draws an arm around your shoulder, pulling your body to him. “She was a jerk, simple as that. Even if she was your Ma.”

His words give you pause – you couldn't deny the truth in it, not really. Instead, you question. “Then why is love so labeled with hate?”

Phainon doesn’t know how to answer that. The hand that was subconsciously drawing circles on your shoulder stiffened in place. “.. Because it’s human nature.”

Did your mom hate you because it was in her nature? Did she yell at you because in her love, hate was the only way she could persist the knowledge that you were physically there? Was hate her love? Your head hurts.

Suddenly, a strong arm pulls you into his chest, positions now switched as you feel your head pushed down to listen to the beat of his heart. His chin on your head, fingers gently unfurling your hair.

“You don’t owe her your defense, your justifications, (name), she doesn’t deserve it. She may have loved you in a cruel way, but you do not owe her a love bigger than what she gave you.”

You don’t respond. Instead, you breathe him in, his scent lingering around the depths of your head, making it fuzzy with something akin to adoration, or devotion.

You inhale once more through his chest, letting the musky scent, marked with something so uniquely his, as if you could take out his heart and crawl your way into a quiet little spot and stay there forever.

So that when his time ran out, you would rot with him.

“I guess I don’t.” You murmured into him, to which he didn’t respond, only tightening his hold around you.

A beat of silence, before he turned your head upwards to look at him again. “Which means you owe me a love as big as the universe!”

You smiled – despite yourself – at his attempt at levity. “That implies you give me a love bigger than the universe.”

“Course I do.” He grinned, all boyish-like and soft. “You might run away if you realize just how big it is.”

Time takes all.

He will be no exception.

Your mouth moves before your brain does, it runs with your heart. “Show me.”

. . . .

.. You can’t help but want to know more – and more, and more and more until nothing is left of you but the knowledge and the burning, scalding desire to know.

The knowledge flows out of you. It takes the form of a black goo.

It burns at the tips of your fingers but you scoop it up and fill it into your mouth until you choke on the desecrating thick liquid.

Your fingers reach for more, greedy as they are.

You want to know why time is so cruel.

You want to know if your mother had ever loved you – if there were a single atom in her body that spared a thought for you that didn’t contain anger.

You want to know what you are made of – why the gods, Kephale, had sculpted you like this. Flesh among flesh.

You want to know Phainon.

You want to know what he likes, the weather he prefers, the things he scrunches his nose up at, the things he jumps up in glee at – what specific spot on the curve of his neck that made his breath hitch, the small birthmarks near his temple, to which you trace – the shape of his lips, sometimes chapped, other times smooth.

You want to know what constellations he had traced on your skin – if it had meaning. You want to know why he looked at you as if you hung the brightest stars in the sky even though he was the spatial mass that held the stars together.

Perhaps this is love – the need and burning craving to know.

. . _

“Show you?” He tilted his head slightly, you nod.

_ _

Time takes all.

You are a coward. You realize in Phainon’s embrace.

“Show me your love. How big it is.” Your hands move from bracing against his chest to meet his face, hands gently smoothing the pad under his eyes with a reverent manner.

Your body was slotted between his thighs, a position that would scare any other kid – never you two.

“.. Okay.”

. _

You are all talk, but no action. You question this, question that – raise doubts at this, peer into books for hours on end like that, but what do you do for these doubts of yours?

Nothing.

You know time takes all. You know everything is predetermined. You thought you’d have a breakthrough, and fight against fate, will yourself up and fight against the preordained nature of destiny, if you were brave enough to question the will and order of the world, weren’t you brave enough to challenge it?

_ .

“Is this enough of a declaration, (name)?”

You cannot think.

Not clearly, because your back was now pressed to the reeds, his arms are by the sides of your head, his body lingering over you on top.

From this angle, he looked more like your Phainon, blushing, nervous and boyish, unlike the hero Cyrene told you he’d someday be.

You’re splayed out on the grass, hair fluttering senselessly against the grass as each strand fills out the gap in the dirt, consumed by the tension.

You swallow a bile from your throat, your voice yet again sounds your desire without your will. “.. More.”

. .

Time takes all.

You allow it, allow the predetermined fate to overtake you, everyone, because you, in your brave camaraderies, your large, imprudent words—

You are inherently selfish, pathetic, and most of all, a coward, who only knew to question but not to challenge.

The knowledge can flow out of you forever, you could know everything – but if you couldn’t trial anything, what worth does the knowledge that buries into your head – flowing out of your trachea, have?

_

“You’re so adorable.” Phainon murmured, all soft and lingering.

His hands move along the curves of your sides, tracing your body as he moves up, up, up – each trace burns with a brazen fire as his fingers move, he stares at his hand as he mapped your body.

Your breath all but hitches. “You’re flattering me.”

“No, I mean it,” He moved his gaze from his lingering hand to your eyes, you searched his eyes for deception as soon as he looked at you, but you found nothing but determination. “You’re so..”

He laced his fingers around your hand, gently bringing it to his lips, pressing a kiss with a devotion that could only be named as worship to your knuckles, it burned your hand.

He softly parts his lips from your hand after a moment, and you feel an ache you don’t acknowledge from the absence of his lips on you.

“.. adorably divine.” And adorably his – Phainon smiled.

_ . _ _

Time takes all.

You feel empty, even in Phainon’s embrace.

Your heart feels abhorrently hollow, like you needed him to fill it up for you. It felt suffocating.

Like there was a spot in your soul – made to fit Phainon’s body, to fit his big stature and it is empty. You needed him to fill it.

“Your hands are so small.” Phainon whispered, devout and all.

His much larger hand lacing back into yours, fitting tightly – he hums in approval. It felt as if you were made to fit him like a puzzle would.

“It was larger than yours when we were younger.”

Phainon tutted, bringing your hand to eye-level, he appraised it quietly. “Well I’m grown now, aren’t I?”

“Barely. You’re like a child sometimes still.”

“Yeah?” He hummed – so soft, so uncharacteristically different.

You find yourself blushing at the way he said it before you could curse your mind to stop.

“.. Yeah.”

“I’ve been getting a lot bigger, though. See?” He lets go of your hand, if only to stretch out his arms and flex the bicep that had been growing – which is quite large, if you’ll be honest.

You blink – and you take in a good look at Phainon once more.

He’s growing. Larger, shoulders broader, chest more lifted, the lopsided grin on his face is still not misplaced but it’s wider, hair fluffier and longer, not unruly like it was before, and he’s—

Being worn down by time.

This is just the peak of the mountain. If it continues, he’ll be worn down. He’ll decay. Fruits are ripe first before they are rotted – he’s just another specimen of time–

“.. I’ll bet the horses are heavy lifting.” You swallowed the thought down, letting it settle in your stomach.

“Pfft – totally are! Y’know, I nearly got assaulted by another this morning. I swear, there’s some personal grudge, it’s not like I poisoned their hay or anything!”

You laughed softly as his hands fell back, bracing themselves to both sides of your face. “What about me? Have I grown?”

Phainon stilled – like, frozen in place kind of still. Like how still a child would be in front of a feral dog still. You see his eyes rake over you, and you also, freeze. For a reason different than his. You feel his eyes wander on your body from bottom to top, and his expression is unreadable at best.

His hands move to take a strand of hair into his fingers, appraising it. “You did. Your hair’s different.”

“Just my hair? Surely there’s more..” You pursed your lips into a slight pout.

Was your hair the only thing that’s changed? Weren’t you, give or take, taller by even a few inches? Prettier?

Phainon shook his head gently with a smooth laugh stitched to that smile he always wore. Tender. “No, not just your hair.”

“.. You’re going to send us both down the reeds if you hold me so tightly.” You said – though the words do not match your inner conviction.

You want him to keep holding you. You want him to squeeze you as tight as he could. Even if his fingernails had dug into your veins and clawed out your blood. Even if it sent the two of you down the yellow hill. You don’t care.

Phainon only chuckled. Not releasing his hold on you in the slightest. It’s firm – but not enough to hurt. He would never hurt you.

He ignores your warning and cards his fingers along your body again. “Your face is different.”

“.. Where?”

He moved his fingers to your jaw, drawing his fingertips along it – it feels ticklish on your skin, but not unwelcoming. “Here. Your face’s a bit wider in your cheeks than it was before.”

You blinked. You did not know that. Was that a bad thing? Were you ran down by time—

“Here as well. Your collarbones are more pronounced.” His fingers moved again.

They never ceased to move, you realized. He always seemed to fidget something, the hem of his sleeve, his shirt.

This time, his fingers linger on the depth of your collarbone.

“I didn’t.. I didn’t notice.”

“I do.” Responded Phainon, the words a casual mask that made you heat up inside. His eyes trail from your collarbone back to your eyes.

You paused, the words piling up in your throat.

“.. Where else?” You pushed him.

He stilled for a beat, before his fingers moved again. You find your heart at a rapid speed as his fingers deftly move lower. “Here.”

“.. And here, and–” Phainon guided his fingers down the valley of your breasts like it was something so casual – your face heats up, a warm emergence – his hands continued down to your stomach, trailing it through the fabric of your tunic, before he stops with a hitch of a breath below your belly.

He abruptly pulls his fingers off of you before it could move on its own accord, hands now back on the grass to brace himself over you, his eyes completely avoided your gaze, but you see the growing hue of pink on his face even from the side – which would be an adept opportunity for you to tease him, had your face not been a bright red as well.

.. what was the burning desire that begged him to continue? Your hands almost move on reflex to grab at his wrist and trace his fingers back lower.

– What a disgusting desire. It’s abhorrent. It’s greedy. You swallow the bile in your throat once more.

Phainon cleared his throat loudly, eyes finally finding yours again. You feel that greedy desire creeping up below your skin.

“.. Ahem! Point is, we’re both pretty grown up, huh?” Phainon coughed out, turning his face back to you in the most schooled-phaidon-expression he could mutter.

The grin on his face would’ve been convincing, if his pink hue of a blush wasn’t so prominent to you.

“I guess so. You’re nearly the tallest kid in our class now.” You smiled, your face – the traitorous nerves that hid beneath your skin they were – was a beet red spectacle as well.

The two of you stared at each other.

Unspeaking – just.. Stared. As if the world had unraveled around the both of you.

As if the very act of looking, seeing could convert you closer into one mass or nothing at all.

Before you both broke out in fits of laughter. The noise jovial among you.

“Your face is so red!” Phainon said, his laugh unceasing as he finally let his arms down, falling next to you on the patch of grass.

You kicked him in retaliation, he laughed harder. “And yours isn’t? You look like those apples on the trees behind your house!”

“Ouch. Low blow, comparing me to apples? Why not something more grandiose?”

“Mm, that’s assuming you deserve such title.”

“Hey!”

A pause or two, and the two of you fall back into a comforting laugh.

.. If you’d ignored the burning, scorching heat that bubbled below when his touch went lower.

The trail his fingers left indented your stomach, you could almost feel it. You could almost yearn for it.

Time takes all.

But you’ll make sure it takes you first.

You are selfish. Heedlessly so.

But then again, you were only human.

⸝⸝ 𖤓𖤓𖤓

The engravings on the walls mark a pair. This engraving on this stone slate is smooth – unlike the slate prior.

This one felt as if it had been redone over and over again until it perceived the texture less carved of stones more insinuations of polished reflections of glass.

A hand smooths over the engravings, it does not fight back.

Νίψον ἀνομήματα μὴ μόναν ὄψιν.

The transcriptions had screamed. A billowing sound – ‘Wash the sins, not only the face’ – sins?

Depictions of the slate are smooth, and it carves out the two figures yet again. Mortal, and divine hero.

The carefully chiseled hero is slumped – of what seems to be rivers of liquid-like substance flowing from each crack on the hero’s body – be it ichor or tears.

Etched near, are fire – a nebulous incision marking every visible gap of the stone slate – the fire spins in a meaningless pattern, chiseled with carelessness yet is the smoothest of all distinct engravings.

Despite that, they still look divine.. If not for the human act they were perceiving.

For the hero holds the mortal in their arms in the middle of the large slate.

The position of the two sends an alarming shiver over █████’s body. Despite that, █████ only smiles in anticipation, an abhorrent twisted grin – though it derives not much more than a neutral grinning expression.

The mortal’s limbs are twisted wrongly – their arms flailed like they were trying to spread it oh so open, but it only looks as if they were painfully twisted. Arms twisting in contrasting directions, fingers unrecognizable as a living being.

Their neck is horribly, sickeningly twisted. To what was supposed to be facing the hero, the cervical vertebrae only twists their head to eye the ground, inhumane.

To what is seen, their skin is pale, much nauseatingly so – costal cartilages of the rib cage peeks out of the skin, diving through their own flesh with little care, it’s hard to believe such bones and flesh were one before.

Everytime one looks away from the mortal’s abhorrently decaying body – a new wound is sustained on the slate the moment their eyes flee back.

The femur is cracked, legs an aberrant revulsion of state.

The temporal skull debauched, mountains of liquid flailing out in agony.

The sternum damaged.

The patella unrecognizable.

Each bone broken.

Muscles a fatuos mess.

The clavicle contorted—

Again, and again.

More, and more, and so much more—until nothing was discernible.

Until the mortal’s body was nothing but a mush of flesh and sin that fought to remain, only for neither to sustain in the end.

The hero remains unchanging in place, however.

The hero’s arms remain steadfast each time – every time a new wound, new bone was sustained a broken menagerie, the hero doesn’t change his footing, he just gathers them closer, and closer to his chest until nothing of the mortal was left – until he was embracing nothing but flesh and the abhorrent hope that he tried so desperately to bury into that mortal.

The slate twists with each glance away and back.

…

O, imprudent one – such folly behaviors that you pertain! You divine have swollen up their buds until nothing of them was left, you and your brash, immodest fire have pried so deep into their souls that you rooted your beatific sins into their pure veins – did you know?

They reek of sin. They reek of sin not of their roots but of the seeds that you clawed deep into their flesh.

. . _

But you seek what they cannot give you! Divine, you seek their life to be infinitive – just as yours do.

Cease your yearning, divinity.

Your life will repeat again, and again if you bear this so adamant, but much like infinity – like a snake finding its own tail, biting down and never letting go – you will only create this paradox for yourself, a cycle of unforgiving consequences as you tie them further to your depraved self.

_ .

The divine will have faults, and your faults – bringer of destruction – is the remaining notion that you will never disappear. You may change forms, switch out parts insubstantial..

But you will forever remain in that eternal cycle of destruction, and thus, re-creation.

You do not deserve them.

Perhaps the divine are more foolish than even the mortals – why would you dare to seek creation in what can only be defined as your destruction embodied?

You do not deserve them.

.. Pathetic.

Behead your fate and yearn for the gods’ answers – clean your sins on this mortal you bound so.

You do not deserve them.

Whether in hope, or negligence in vain – prisoner, do not mistake your standing.

You do not deserve them.

‘Wash the sins, not only the face’, ravager.

⸝⸝ 𖤓𖤓𖤓

Phainon has always considered himself to be somewhat of a ‘ball of fire’. It’s cliche, sure – but he thinks it’s what everyone means when they call him deliverer.

A fiery wheel.

Spinning in constant notion, that solar coronation halo that crowned him a state higher than the cards that the other kids in Aedes Elysiae got. Phainon was a fire concoction of woeful emotions.

Whereas the kids would get ‘drunkard’ or.. ‘villager’, Phainon received the deliverance – he was that fiery wheel, wasn’t he?

He was crowned that wheel.

He spins like a ball of fire, his teacher, Pythias would say.

Standing up to answer a question with absolute confidence. Completing his exams with a handwriting sprawled like it owed him something, as if his words could save embroidery in history. His words sprung like fire. It was refreshing, his teacher remarked.

He fights like a ball of fire, his friends complimented.

They swung their wooden swords all day in the flaxen fields – Andreas would scoff a compliment, Livia would exclaim with joy, Iraklis would pat him on the shoulder. He was made for the sword, they praised. Like a spinning fire that didn’t douse, they repeated. He’d be an amazing savior, they chanted as he freed a chimera from a bush that knew only to trap.

He lived like a ball of fire, his parents opined, their voices rang clear bells like the one in front of his home.

His mother said he grew like a ball of fire, his father said he ate like a consuming ball of fire. They say he grew like fire did – lively and active. So vigorous, they breathed. So thoughtful, they hummed as he saved bits of leftover food for the animals in the field.

He had the determination like a ball of fire, his trusted friend and part-time consultant, Cyrene would mention.

Her eyes glimmered with mischief as she flicked his forehead. He had motivation unceasing like fire, she whispered. It was like the act of deliverance, and time would tell, her maturity waged with her words.

He smiled like a ball of fire, his other half, most beloved one, had said to him.

You said he smiled like a ball of fire, with the dawn sliding down the sides of your face and stray leaves carded in your hair, his breath hitched then.

It’s different from what other people have told him. Smiling? That’s hardly anything compared to fighting like a ball of fire!

Smiling is too.. Intimate, perhaps.

He doesn’t find himself liking your definition.

(Besides, in his opinion, your smile outweighs any fire, star that burns – even the mass of a star that is the sun.)

The fire flowed endlessly through his veins, burning at each carnasses in him.

It fought to grasp each nerve that raptured him, it sought to clench that ardor of his so – that fire, that fire that was him, that fire that was solely his psyche – threatened to clutch at him.

–

Now, that fire burnt through Aedes Elysiae.

Each breath that Phainon took had his lungs protesting – it clawed its trajectory up Phainon’s throat as he slashed through what he could of monsters emerging from the black tide.

His grip on the sword only tightens, and Phainon’s circulatory system pulses with yellow trickling blood.

And everything hurts. His body is slammed to the ground once more, he stands up, the stupid makeshift sword still in hand.

Because Aedes Elysiae is burning.

He tries to turn away, flees his eyes on something else. Phainon looks back in hopes the scenery is back to the home he loves so – but it doesn’t.

When he looks away, all he sees are burgeoning fire, when he turns – hoping for the sight of the calm village he knew – he sees only more of those fires that persisted.

He could look back and forth as much as he pleases – it would never change the scenery.

He doesn’t want to keep fighting, no.

If it were up to him, he would lie back down onto the reeds of his home – albeit slightly stricken with newfound blood – but he would let his golden blood rain down as he sighed a hint of relief.

But he doesn’t get that relief, not him, not the deliverer.

Because it was his Aedes Elysiae that was burning.

His Aedes Elysiae that had the chiefs that wrung through the children with life lessons – he caught them screaming in stricken agony not long ago as the blade of a monster pulled through the flesh of the old man that used to carry him away from the fields.

Now, the village chief’s body is wrung through the ground, spilling organs onto the grass.

He wanted to puke.

His Aedes Elysiae that had no conflicts – nothing like this. It was peaceful. His peaceful home that harbored no conflict. J

ust the day earlier, he was hanging out the old, wrinkly port of the village – now that very wooden port was desecrated into the waters.

He needed to puke.

His Aedes Elysiae that had his family – gods, his mother, and father. Where were they?

He couldn’t tell the burning houses apart. Not with the fire, the gas that swelled so abhorrent against his senses. He disliked this – iron smell of fire, he decided.

His arms moved again, the sword piercing through another monster. His leg dragged behind him – he believed it was broken, but he did not want to look back, for he would be too afraid to move forward if he looked back.

His Aedes Elysiae that held home to his parents – who carried a roof above his head, nurtured him with love they could and wrapped him in arms of warmth when all became too cold.

Who rooted in him the desire to protect. Who rooted in him the need to save – who laid beneath the dirty rubble of his once-home, now only a defiled mess of wreckage.

His arms outstretch, his fingers reach for something – anything. A hand to hold. A body to embrace. A face to caress. A home to return. He thinks of your face, and his fingers move quicker, reaching higher, only to close around nothing.

He was all alone, after all.

His Aedes Elysiae that had Cyrene, who carried those divination cards. He thought back to the deliverance fate he was given, and mourned the village that was burning up in front of his eyes. No hero turns a blind eye to this –

Do not look back.

His leg is twisted, he could almost feel the pain, but he ignores it all the while.

DO NOT LOOK BACK.

Whatever you do — do not look back.

Your heart will scream for it. Your mind will yearn for it. Your leg will abide by it. Your body will turn to it. Your mouth will beg for it.

Despite that,

DO

NOT

LOOK–

“Phainon..”

He looked back.

As soon as he heard the soft whimper that cascaded like rivers out of your mouth, his mind didn't care for anything but the thought that he had to look back.

Phainon had whipped his head back so hard it pained him agonizingly to do so.

His neck twisted as his body followed in due, but something burned in his soul – something that scorched so greatly it overtook all the pain in his other nerves and pushed him to look.

He looked back, in theory and in action.

He could taste the metallic tang of blood on his tongue, as well as the shredded bloodied clothing edges that clung against his sweaty skin, gods – it hurted. Phainon groaned against the pain as he abruptly turned his body back, but he did not hesitate to keep turning.

Because most of all–

His Aedes Elysiae had you.

You. You. You. You. You. You. You.

You, in every sense of the world.

You could simply whisper his name and he’d come crawling to you if his legs were smashed.

You, where were you?

His leg dragged against the ground, creating a river of golden ichor that followed his steps, the tip of his sword dragged against the dirt, his shoulders slumped.

Phainon feels a dread – the kind of dread that grew hands and dug its nails into the flesh of his heart.

The hand drawled its traces from his heart up to his throat, threatening to make him puke. Phainon’s hand quickly shot up to cover his mouth as he dragged his right leg across the fields to you.

Your voice sounded far away – like that pitch of dread that delighted him, like a mist that only he got the privilege of being ensnarled under.

DO NOT LOOK BACK–

Screw that!

Phainon’s knees buckled down onto the floor, his legs that were twisted in a revolting manner dragged against the blood-soaked ground of the village, he crawled.

He digs his fingers into the dirt, feels the grime in his nails – he only uses it as a matter of transport, as he hurls his body forward by all means.

DO NOT LOOK BACK, YOU FOOL.

Shut up.

Phainon tries to stand upright, chanting your name underneath his breath like a prayer – perhaps to Oronyx, perhaps to Kephale, perhaps to just you that seeks his voice like that dying prayer of a man fallen.

He falls again onto the blood-soaked soot.

HOW PATHETIC. TO LOOK BACK IS TO CARE. DO YOU?

I do. So what?

His snowy white hair fell back against the dirt. He pushes himself up again – like a cycle of repetition.

But he doesn’t mind the tattered clothes, he doesn’t mind the dirtied hand that stuck with grime, he doesn’t mind his shaking hands which could barely hold properly the sword, he doesn’t mind the smashed leg that he keeps dragging against the floor, protesting against his very move.

Because if he stopped – it meant he would be leaving you behind.

He never once considered that.

YOUR HEART HARBORS WRATH. DO NOT LOOK BACK.

Wrath isn’t all that it harbors.

Phainon screamed – so loud some monsters had backed up. The sound was raw and aching from the back of his throat.

He bellowed, his throat scratching and his trachea blocking his anger – but that scream, ear-piercing and wrath filled as it was – derived quickly into rapid sobs.

Tears mixed with cinders of ashes as it racked against his cheeks.

Still, he keeps going.

YOU YEARN TO DESTROY EVERYTHING. YOU DO NOT CARE. DO NOT LOOK BACK.

I yearn to create. I yearn to love. I yearn for her. Do not tell me what I yearn for.

He repeated your name like a mantra, a madman, if you will.

He stands up yet again, leg aching. He is able to achieve a few meters before he falls back onto the ground. Your name leaves his lips achingly as he moves.

Phainon still doesn’t see you – and something horrible, something sickenly terrifying starts to harbor in his stomach.

The bile rises like boiling water once more. It blocks his airways. It rakes on his throat, it digs its nails into the skin of his neck from inside.

IR█TO█ IS YOUR N█ME – STOP LOOKING BACK.

My name is Phainon.

YOUR NAME IS IR█TO█ – TURN AWAY. DO NOT LOOK BACK. YOU–

Stop telling me –

“What to do already!” Phainon huffed, his legs carrying him in desperation as he clawed his way to that tree he remembers so well.

These loud thoughts – they feel invasive, like a bug instilled into his brain, buzzing unprecedentedly.

“(name).” A breathy whisper left him, as he finally found a strength in his legs to stand – forcing himself upright as his hands impatiently reached for something in the air – a glimpse, or just one blink of you, perhaps.

Phainon gasped, seeing that tree in his line of sight.

He needed you – he needed you to be alive. He needed the world to stop burning, for his home to be his once more.

He needed for the fire to cease and the soft radiance of dawnlight to shine on his village once more.

But when his eyes catch onto you – he wishes he had not looked for you in the first place.

In the burning sea of flaxen reeds, in the corrupted, blackened sea of wheat laid you.

Phainon’s breath desperately caught in his throat, and every sin that Phainon had eaten rises up onto his throat unforgivingly like a sickened bile, threatening its claws to make him vomit and clean his body dry of substance.

Your body was horribly beaten – as it seemed.

A river of crimson blood flown carelessly out of the gash of your stomach, your head resting against the bark of the tree as if offered some semblance of reverence.

Your eyes were closed, your head tilted back.

You were dead. You were dead and this is it.

This is the end – he could now only hold your body into his lap and believe that you were just sleeping.

His legs move before his mind comprehends, his arms reach out and fingers outstretched as he takes your body into his arms, cradling it with the most gentleness he could utter, throwing the wooden makeshift sword somewhere no violence could reach you.

Terror and dread fills each corner of his veins, and his eyes are wide in terrified panic. “No, no, no..” Phainon murmured, looking over each spot of your body desperately. “Please, please–”

“Phainon.. ?”

A blink of relief – small as it was – overcame him. Hope showered his form as his eyes flew open to the weak sound that came out of your mouth, soft and weak, but alive.

You were alive. You’re alive. He can save you.

“(name). (name), you’re okay. We’re okay. I can fix this, I can.” His face is pale as a ghost as he cradled you, eyes roaming over your body with fear.

“.. Phainon–”

“No, no, no, no.. no – no, I can fix this, okay? You won’t be dying here.” His voice was trembling when he spoke, his voice barely above a hoarse whisper, ragged and broken.

He rips a fabric from the hem of his dirtied tunic, it came out small, insufficient.

Nevertheless, he wrapped what he could over your injured stomach, tightening it into a makeshift tourniquet, his breaths ragged and uneven as his shaking hands tried their best to place pressure on your stomach, to which you winced.

His eyes are wild, face pale with worry. His breathing is heavy, as if he’d had just ran a marathon and couldn’t seem to chase the air into his lungs. “I’m sorry – gods, I’m so sorry, (name). I’m so sorry, I’m late – so late.

But.. but I don’t know what to do, I don’t!”

⸝⸝ 𖤓𖤓𖤓

“Look, Phai! This one’s paired together.” You smiled, holding in your hand a bud of two conjoined flowers, stem tangled together, petals mixed in trepidation.

Phainon, piqued at your words, ran from his own spot on the vast flower fields and to you with swift legs.

Not wasting a moment before the flowers he had held in his hands – a sunflower, it was – fell to the ground as he ran to you.

He knelt down, eyes sparkling with the vigor much of a kid’s.

“No way, let me see!”

You maneuvered the conjoined flower to his peering eye, to which you could feel the childishness reigning from his motions.

“Hmm, do you think.. It’s because they didn’t wanna leave each other?” You posed, a small thought under your breath.

Phainon murmured under his breath, scratching his chin in thought. “Well, maybe it’s because they’re fated to be linked! Look, see? It’s like they were made like this. Made together.”

“Mm.. but what if they wanna go to different places?”

“Then they’ll go together!”

“But what if they have different goals?”

“Can’t they achieve both of their goals at different times together?”

“But what if they yearn for something else other than the other? Isn’t it a little.. I dunno, stuffed with the same flower all the time?”

THEN THEY WILL CLAW INTO THE OTHER’S STEM, DIGGING THEIR EARTHLY SOUL WITH APRICITY AND SOIL THEMSELF UNTIL THEY CAN’T PART.

“Mm, is it?” Phainon tilted his head, chin in his fingers.

“.. Should we separate them?” You thrummed in thought, twirling the pistil of the flowers around.

–

“No!” With a surprising speed, Phainon’s hand curled around the stem of the flowers, bringing them to his chest in a gesture that could only be described as protective – possessive.

His eyes sharpen, and his words are clipped. “Don’t separate them.”

You blinked, lightly shocked. His eyes were wide, scared, almost – for a pair of flowers he had only seen for a few seconds. It makes you shiver, this look in his eyes. The desperation. “Why?”

WHY, ARE YOU SO PROTECTIVE OF THOSE? OF THEM. OF THE NEEDINESS OF THE FLOWERS. OF THE POSSESSION. OF THE COALESCE THE FLOWERS ENVOKED?

“Because.. Because they need each other! See? If you separate them, the other’s petals would rip as well. You can’t separate them without hurting the other!” Phainon holds the flowers to your eye. He’s right. They’re conjoined, but almost disgustingly so.

DISGUTING. NASTY. THROW UP. CRAWL THAT BILE OUT OF YOUR THROAT AND SPLATTER IT AS IF IT IS NOTHING BUT A DECLARATION OF A LIFE.

The white petals are fused with one another, almost inorganic, it looked. The stem tangled around each other in a deferential dance that lasted to only them.

It looks unnatural.

It looks lab grown and bred through means of inert, man-made mechanics.

It looks disgusting – like it hurted the flowers to be fused.

But it exists because the other does, so if one flower were to be blemished, broken –

The other would not survive for long.

.. So you nod, and place your hand over his grip on the pair of flowers. “Okay. They’ll stay together then.”

They’ll never be separated – even if it kills them.

Maybe one was made for the other, manufactured just for them to be paired up, petals fused in an unorthodox conduct.

They’ll never be separated – so when they die, it’ll be their bodies that merge together.

It’ll be the other flower’s face that it sees before either dies, it’ll be with the same flower that it rots from.

The rot would take over the petals, the stems, and the bulbs.

ROTPR-OOR0E–CONSUMEE19203LONEIIKKKWN293–

“.. This never happened.”

⸝⸝ 𖤓𖤓𖤓

“Phainon.” You squeaked out, voice weak, feeble and debilitated as you raise your bloodied, torn-off hands to his face – he whimpered as if the pain it took you to even speak his name hurted him as it did you, and grabs your reaching hand to press it into his cheek.

He gaped, the sound weak and pathetic.

He does not speak. Does not want to. He does not wish to pollute your voice with the sound of his own pathetic whimpers, for this may be the last of your voice he ever hears.

He wishes he could claw out his voicebox and dig it into you, so you would say a few more than a mess spluttered with bloodied lips and a dying rasp.

Phainon, who never hesitates, found himself hesitating to even answer, just to preserve your face a moment more.

He reluctantly whispered, as low as possible. “.. Yes?”

“.. –Do me.. a favor, please.” Rasped your voice. Lowly, weakly, it declared so.

“.. Anything. Anything you want. I’ll give you everything.”

“Okay.”

Your fingers trail to the wooden sword he had thrown – when did you get your hands on that?

He’d thrown it where violence couldn’t find your breath, where cruelty wouldn’t seek your name – and now you bring it back into his palm.

“Kill me.. Please kill me – please.”

He lets out a pathetic, strangled cry. Flinching backwards as if he’d been slapped. His expression is mortified – you’ve never seen that look on his face before. It was similar, you premised, to the face he’d have when he just had a nightmare.

“No – I can’t .. I can’t do that. I won’t. Please don’t ask that of me. Anything else, anything! I’ll do anything but that!”

You smiled, gentle and all, and he nearly cried out in agony.

You situate the sword above your chest, lightly caressing his hand that held the wooden stake.

“Phainon,” You whispered, gazing up at his eyes which were filled with tears. The harsh sobs wracked through him as it fell on you with drops, fusing into the bleeding, spread like a delicate flower.

The world goes white, his eyes, his ears – they fuss endlessly, buzzing with trepidation.

His heart drops, and it settles in his stomach. A terrible, squeezing pressure.

His eyes didn’t know where to settle. It rakes from the yellow tree that held your body under its shade, the wheat crushed under the weight of your flesh, the red crimson fading with yellow.

It forms a sickening orange – not like the dawn Kephale always held under you and Phainon’s naive form, but an orange that sung curses and strangled sin into mortals.

All he ended up doing was cry. Not bawling, but a quiet, chest-chokes.

He doesn’t know when his arms started to raise the wooden sword.

A swell of helplessness came over him, a drowning sensation, as if he had been toppled overboard and swept away by the stupid river waves near his home, where he’d sit and stare at you for hours.

And the wooden sword came down before he knew it.

The woods beside him rang with the rasp of his screams as wood met flesh, maggots met organs and rot met tissues.

The sun over Kephale’s shoulder doesn’t move lower or higher, it remains in one spot for hours.

But for the white haired boy with eyes that fleeted the sky, the sun never rose again.

⸝⸝ 𖤓𖤓𖤓

“And.. that’s it!” You huffed, closing the storybook with a dramatic finale gesture.

“That can’t be it! Orpheus looked back just like that! Why would he do that?” Phainon exclaimed deliriously, flailing his hands as he pried the book from your palm.

You laughed as he fleeted his eyes through the book, looking through the story himself to confirm if the story you told was accurate, it was, much to his mire. “Well, Orpheus cared a whole lot about Eurydice.” Suggested your voice.

“But if he had just not looked, they’d both have made it out alive!” Phainon groaned in exasperation, dropping the book, letting the pages be whizzed through by the zephyr before he thumped down on the wheat field. “If it were me, I’d have made it out, easy and all.”

You pursed your eyebrows.

Your finger rose to flick his forehead in response to the bold claim, taking your seat near his whining form on the field. He yelped in protest, and pulled a hand up to rub the spot you offended him in.

Settling your knees to your chest, drawing your arms around your leg – you let your eyes take in the sight you’ve seen millions of times before: Kephale stood before you, dawn ever desiring, a mumble falling out from beneath your arm. “‘Cause he loves her.”

LOVE.

Phainon raised an eyebrow at your words. “But.. he could’ve loved her more had they made it out of the underworld.”

“You idiot,” You sulked, jutting your lips. “To love someone is to look back.”

Phainon stayed silent, putting his hands beneath his head. Eyes momentarily drifting to you. He almost shudders.

You continued, voice all melancholic. “If I was Eurydice, and you were Orpheus.. You’d look back, right?”

Phainon pursed his lips at the thought. He couldn’t imagine it, not really. Having to crawl through the nether realm and clawing at Thanatos’ divine authority to steal you back so warm life could embrace you instead of the deafening coldness of death – something in his heart jerks at the thought.

Hesitantly, words leave his mouth. “.. I’d try not to, so I could bring you back.”

“But if I fall or .. or if you don’t hear me, you’d look back.”

He couldn’t resist looking at you.

“Yeah. I probably.. Wouldn’t last long.”

You chuckled at that, his heart skips another traitorous beat at the sound. “I know.” You smiled, releasing your knee from the wrap of your arms, letting it settle onto the grass below, fleshed out and all.

FATE.

“.. But if I failed.. I’d go back again. I’d find you and then I’d bring you out. If I look back again, I’ll just go back each time.”

Taken aback, your mouth went dry before you laughed softly. “You’d do all that?” Your head tilted as Phainon’s eyes met yours.

Nothing less than determination sized in his eyes. His ambition felt larger than yourself. Phainon nodded without a beat. “Why wouldn’t I?”

OVERTURN.

“.. Well, let’s hope it doesn’t come to that, hm?” Your body fell next to him, released from the sitting position to sprawl on the bed of the field, he smiled as the heat of your closed on him.

“Yeah, that’d save me the trouble.” Phainon offered you a grin, bumping your shoulder with his.

STILL, DOES ONE REMAIN THE SAME, EVEN IF ALL OF THEIR ORIGINAL COMPONENTS HAVE BEEN REPLACED OVER TIME?

⸝⸝ 𖤓𖤓𖤓

Letter 24.

I miss you. I miss you. I miss you. I miss you. I miss you. I miss you. I miss you. I miss you. I miss you. I miss you. I miss you. I miss you. I miss you. I miss you. I miss you. I miss you. I miss you. I miss you. I miss you. I miss you. I miss you. I miss you. I miss you. I miss you. I miss you. I miss you–

⸝⸝ 𖤓𖤓𖤓

He slammed the mire with his fists until the wheat stalks were mixed with golden and crimson blood alike, and for those first hours without you, he didn’t deliver any words but wails and cries.

His hands flew to his throat, digging into the skin as he attempted to tear out his voicebox for reasons unknown even to him. It felt like it was karma he needed to endure, for being the force that drove that wooden stake into your stomach.

It must’ve hurted. The sword was dull. It must’ve been agonizing. The wooden sword could barely kill an animal, yet he had pierced it through you and allowed the porous surface to dig through your tissues.

He puked.

FATE REALIZED.

ETERNAL OCCURENCE 1: SUCCESS.

A stone slate begins to form with 2 figures.

⸝⸝ 𖤓𖤓𖤓

Letter 2526.

To my beloved of all,

I miss you. Wholly do I speak of this pain that settles beneath me, for it clings to you still. You are missing from me, and I do not know what to make of this pitiful void that I’ve seen one time, another, and millions of times by now.

How many times has it been? How many times have I seen your body grow cold under my palms and limp against my chest for your blood spreads as flowers may throughout the fields in the springtime – I do not know why I have to endure this, of all things. I can endure a lot, (name). I can. I have endured a lot.

Truth is, it has been 165 cycles. . I pray under your corpse each night after you die in each reoccurrence, I curse my breath each time I see your face again because it meant it was another time you would die below the sinking breath of my hands again and I truly, selfishly wish that even despite how many times your blood is spilt over me that even so, even holding this disgusting monster in your arms, that you could find it in yourself to still love me.

Dawn is forthcoming in Okhema, I feel you would’ve liked this town, for all its bright nature. Only once, decades ago where I stood with their people, now I stand against them. You would’ve stopped me. Called my name and whispered it in the darkness and prayed on your knees to all the titans because that’s who you were, and who I had snuffed away in darkness and fear.

Still, I imagine this town would’ve been much to your liking.

I miss you.

I miss the life you breathed into me. I miss the stories you used to tell me under the shade of our naivety, and I miss the you who should’ve been receiving these letters that trace the diary of a madman.

I will keep writing. A dead body won’t receive these letters, a lifeless corpse won’t answer my pleas and heed my calls even if I wrung myself dry and pour litres of golden ichor, but I will still write these letters to a future you’re in. Where we can simply lie against the grass again, and there, we can talk about nothing and everything at once.

It also means I can pretend there will be a ‘you’ that receives this record of insanity. Written by a lunatic with too much love to fill, and not a body of life to fill in.

I ████ you, and that, perhaps, is the root of this insanity.

From your Phainon.

⸝⸝ 𖤓𖤓𖤓

LOOP 2.

Phainon awoke to a dawn – the yellow wheat lightly shuffled below his body, his tousled snow-white hair shambling across the surface of something soft, cyan-like eyes adjusting to the weight of Kephale’s protection. It smells faint of cinnamon and baked bread – the piquancy of a welcoming arm to his awaken.

“You’re awake.” A voice ushered him woke, gentle and soft-spoken. YOU whispered above his face, akin to a likening of breeze that embraced him gently, the forbearing resonance only threatened to lull the young boy asleep yet again.

Phainon stuttered open – shock crazed his face, fear overturned his demeanor as he met your eyes. He nearly pukes when he meets the fond look you retain.

“(name). Is this real.. ? You’re–” Phainon whispered, the words spoken low, as if he was afraid had his voice been any louder, you would’ve disappeared from his sight once more. His arms are tightly wrapped around you before you could comprehend his words filled with shock and glimpse of fear.

He’s breathing in breaths that sounded like it hurted, almost like he’s struggling to even see himself.

He desperately pressed his ear to your heart, feeling your chest rise up, down, up, down, fingers clawing into the material of your tunic, pathetically clinging to your body as he seated between your legs.

Your fingers reach behind his neck, craning him with soothing circles, but he doesn’t calm as he does when you do it.

Your voice is quiet when you attempt to shake him out of the fear that seemed to choke the bile in his trachea.

“Phainon? What’s..”

“You’re real. You’re alive. This is real. You’re back.” Phainon stared into nothing and everything. Grass beneath him. The same tree you always sat under. The same cliff you two swore to the stars below.

He’s back, and you’re alive once more.

Phainon looked at your face, really looked at you. He stared at the eyes that stared back with fondness and affection, and carved into his mind the shape of your lips, the upturn of your smile, the faint hue of your skin near the pad of your ear. He notes the hollow of your neck, the prominence of your collarbone, and he wants to drown himself in the you he missed so dearly.

You’re alive.

This time, he won’t let you–

ETERNAL OCCURENCE FAILURE.

FATE DECIDED.

⸝⸝ 𖤓𖤓𖤓

Your lifeless body hung beneath his feet again, crimson blood filing through the wheat. His wooden sword is through the tissue of your abdomen, and tears are bleeding through his eyelids again, voice hoarse as he begs and begs and begs.

Again.

“One more time– ! Give her to me once more!” Screamed the white haired boy, swearing to the skies, tribulation to the warring of his psyche, terror of his heart, and the aching emptiness in his body.

Once again, he tore off his sun from the sky.

Once again, the cycle restarts, as his legs move to the eternal city of Okhema.

FATE REALIZED.

ETERNAL OCCURENCE 2: SUCCESS.

⸝⸝ 𖤓𖤓𖤓

Orpheus, why do you look back so?

LOOP 149.

When Phainon faced Lygus – the antikythera robot who spoke in riddles and proposed neutrality, his eyes were full of anger. Seething and rage is the only thing that represents how he feels, fire and vexation smolders beneath his skin.

The vortex of genesis swirled around the two figures, the coreflames screamed beneath his lungs, digging from below his vein, the hemoglobin boiled, too, testament of his anger, monument to his fury as his eye met with red, mechanical ones.

“Lygus.”

“Lord Phainon, here heeds your final step. Complete the Era Nova, drop that worldbearing coreflame, and as a nameless hero, tread the unknown.” Lygus smiled, a hand adhering Phainon to the spirit basin, ushering his call.

“Cut the crap,” Whispered Phainon, a hoarse call, as his hand tightened the grip on the hilt of dawnmaker. “Answer me this, and answer me truthfully. Who are you?”

To Phainon’s chagrin, the antikythera took him time to answer, with the added nerve to wander around, a flare of hand waving for no other reason but to tick the nerves already at limit in Phainon.

“You seek truth, and truth you may. You see, we are but prisoners in a cave, locked in and bided to the shadows. But you and I alone, lord Phainon, are the sole wanderers of the cave, carved away our chains and set alight to the real world. We are witnesses of the real world, of ‘truth’.”

“Stop speaking in riddles.” Phainon scowled, jaw ticked with impatience. Lygus does not appear phased, nor does his eyes waver in ambition, but he simply continued his tale at the same pace.

“So, as we are witnesses of the truth, and you, the savior of Amphoreus, shall you burn this truth onto your people, and allow them to bathe in the light of your absolute? You step pride into daylight, lord Phainon, you may bring the prisoners of Amphoreus their truth of Era Nova–”

“I said stop speaking so much.”

“.. Deliever of all worlds, there is a sun that burns in you,” Smiled the antikytheran, to which Phainon tensed noticeably. “I have vaguely witnessed that sun you bear so close. Fascinating, it is. An infatuation so absolute that it leaves a sun into the heart of the prophesied deliverer.”

“Stop it–”

“The sun is shaped out of a woman. (name), isn’t it? What tragic fate she bears, but a prisoner’s fate will always be the chained one.”

Orpheus, carry your body away, for you have left your soul in the underworld.

One second, the head of the robot is intact, shaped with electrical currents, and the other –

Phainon has slung Lygus’ head to the ground, dawnmaker a prophesied weapon.

His voice had a low timbre when he spoke next. “Don’t talk about her.”

The decapitated head – much to Phainon’s irk – laughed, a mirthful, bright, laugh, though more sadistic than it seemed. “Marvelous! How enticing – your character module is changing! Your fury factor arises a statistically significant soar when her name is so much as mentioned. So this is it – the final relationship factor, the null hypothesis was inaccurate, it truly was deliberation!”

“This ends now! Stop talking! I’ll ignite the dawn with my light, and awaken Era Nova, where she can finally–”

“Era Nova is but a lie, lord Phainon. Naivety gets you nowhere, surely you understand even that.”

“What?”

“You may shatter that woeful effigy, hero – but understand this: your wish to bring her back will never work.”

Phainon delivered a swift kick to Lygus’ head, making the mechanical body part roll elsewhere, lolling among the floor of the vortex of genesis, smile still unceasing. Phainon sucked a heavy breath, lingering and shaky.

“– You’re beaten, Lycurgus. A mere prisoner like yourself with the delusion of a witness should never raise their voice in meaningless prattle.” Seethed Phainon, his eyes racked with fury – fury packed with the hundreds of regressions before him, fury packed with the regressions to come.

The white haired boy of Aedes Elysiae now, carries the furies of his past, present, and future.

“.. And yet a hollow man like yourself continues to speak? Tell me, what is it that drives you forward, lord Phainon? For that rage, that fury you contain – is eerily close to the love you pertain,” Lygus recovered, lacerating at a subject that would sure to set Phainon off.

“Let me allow you in on something: the girl with the bright eyes whom you look for? You will never find her. Not in the new Era Nova, and even if she returns – her code is broken in thousands. Her ‘self’ is ordained by an unchanging fate of recurring death, that is the fate she must realize.”

“Then I will see it through. You say there are codes of her broken in thousands? Fine. Be it however long, I will find all of them, and piece her together. Her fate is ordained? No matter. I will transcend fate. You mistake one thing, Lycurgus. You mistake fury for love: but a prisoner like you could never gauge at emotions this sincere. Fury, you fated prisoner, is the outcome of a love misplaced.”

O, Orpheus, you hopeless fool. How the muses sing in pity of your tale, how their stares bide into your secretion. Melpomene denotes the tragedy with a flick of her elegant dagger.

“Anger? Wrath? Fine, define me so. But never believe that I may, even for a second, give up. You have patience? Test this hypothesis, then: I’ll make sure your sick abhorrence of an experiment bears no fruits.”

IDEOGRAPHIC. QUALITATIVE. REALITY. TRUTH–

⸝⸝ 𖤓𖤓𖤓

LOOP 198,372.

There are some things in the world that one must always pair together for the function to work.

For example, purines and pyrimidines, nitrogenous bases in DNA, research and evidence, kidneys, ovaries–

And Phainon simply cannot exist without his pair, for he would not function ideally.

Therefore, he does what any madman does, and more. He dug through cycles and cycles of deaths, recurring lifetimes of stolen warmth and laughter, and built you from the genesis of your creation.

He piled up first the DNA modules. The genetic information, the pieces of you that lingered in structures of double helix, that deoxyribonucleic acid were the easiest to find, for you shed yourself to him countlessly, all he had to do now, was to pick up those scattered fragments, however small.

⸝⸝ 𖤓𖤓𖤓

Letter 1650.

I will fix you. I swear on it, and I will carve my blood onto this oath for life if I have to will myself to.

Until then, wait for me, (name).

I will fix you, I swear of it.

I met a girl who looked like you, her eyes were mirrors of the brightness that your irises touched, and her hair were at a length near yours. She was young, much like you, back in Aedes Elysiae. Her eyes knew not of anger, emotions knew not a touch of fear, but she flinched when I approached her.

I fear I am losing my humanity.

I have gone rigid, my arms move in a motion that makes it hard for me to even write as of now, yet my brain refuses for my hands to stop moving.

The girl who looked like you, her name was Antigone. She looked at me like I was a ghost, and perhaps I was. I stared at her because she was the mirror of a ghost I chased after.

That was the only time which I felt myself feel warm instead of rigid coldness that seemed to cling to me as of late.

The girl spoke in quiet mutters, much like you would’ve. She hummed her favorite songs later, and I waved goodbye to her with a most horrible ache in my chest.

So, I drew my sword.

I will fix you. I swear of it.

.. From Phainon, hope fully, still yours.

⸝⸝ 𖤓𖤓𖤓

LOOP 1,932,387.

The next he found were the skeletons.

The spinal cord, the frontal lobe, the pelvic girdle, the femur, humerus and even the ilium – all of it had to be found. So, Phainon’s hand dug through layers of skin and blood once more, until all 206 bones were found.

He digs through thousands more of cycles. It was hard to find bones that fitted in place, but perseverance, as appeared, was his strong suit.

⸝⸝ 𖤓𖤓𖤓

Letter 4041.

I won’t forget you, and I’ll never forget you.

I’ve witnessed once, this singular cycle where I did save you, kept you alive, and I thought it was the one – in it, you fell in love with someone else.

In it, you lived, but no longer for me, and no longer do you hand your heart over to the soles of my palms.

I refuse that probability. I refuse that the only world where you live – the only world in which you are happy is the one where I am not the one you love.

Am I the curse bestowed upon you?

.. regardless of your answer, I remain steadfast in my objective.

I have not yet forgotten you, and I don’t think I ever can.

From Phainon.

⸝⸝ 𖤓𖤓𖤓

LOOP 3,749,203.

The next he found were the skin.

⸝⸝ 𖤓𖤓𖤓

Letter 6494.

Why .. Did you leave me?

⸝⸝ 𖤓𖤓𖤓

LOOP 5,932,657.

After that, was the prime mover of life. The thing he needed to make you again, the thing he needed for this piled up mess of organs, skin, and DNA sequences to become a human.

He mulled over the primer for years. Going through cycles, venturing through his options – before he stumbled upon it.

The dawn of Kephale.

Phainon’s hand gently outreached to the scorching of the dawn, tearing away a piece of it, chipping a light that was meant to be fractured onto the cities, and took it into his palm and shoved it into the vacant place where your heart should be, instead – there’s a part of the sun.

His eyes narrow – there was something missing.

He didn’t know what, but there was something that was missing from you.

So, dawnmaker sliced through the thickness of his black wing, and once more, wrapped it into the confines of the vacant space of your heart wordlessly.

He was missing from you.

Now–

⸝⸝ 𖤓𖤓𖤓

“Stop.”

“Hmn? Don’t like the story?” Cyrene perks up, face all smiles and teasing.

“.. It’s cruel. Don't you think it's cruel? How could someone do this? All of this?”

“I do agree, it is! That Lygus guy is a total jerk, isn’t he? I wish I could punt him myself! But.. a cruel story, too, can have a good ending.” Her pink hair flows with the wind, the curve of her lips move in a captivating manner as does herself.

“.. Cyrene, this is horrible. What – what kind of story is this? It’s needlessly cruel. It’s not real, right?”

She’s quiet for a moment, as if mulling it over as her eyes roam around your expression, before she beams. “It’s not!”

You breathe a sigh of relief, but catch it as she speaks once more.

“But does it matter if the story is real or not? The emotions are real, right?”

“What does that mean?”

Cyrene smiles. “Love is cruel, love is unbinding, and love is obsession. Didn’t you notice that throughout the story, (name)?”

You purse your lips. Of course you did. It was hard not to, anyway. “Yeah.”

“So, I’ll ask you this again,” She flails her body seated on the swing below the shade of the tree, her finger pointing to you. “Do you like romance stories?”

“.. Yes.”

Cyrene laughs, a giggle escaping from her youthful demeanor. “I knew it. You really are the essence of love.”

⸝⸝ 𖤓𖤓𖤓

There was a myth in Amphoreus – no one knew where it came from, just that it was common knowledge among the inhabitants. No matter if one were Kremnoan, Aidonian, or Dolosian, this myth was treated as a generational story, history could not, would not, forget it.

There was once a figure – Phaethon, whom upon curiosity stumbled upon the chariot which drew the sun that arose in the sky. He was the sky’s blood and flesh, and the chariot was his partner.

Amphoreus then had no dawn, nor any sun. No light to gaze upon them, no eyes to see them through.

When his hand traveled around the reins of the golden chariot, he was appalled by desire, taken by greed. Despite fervent warnings and dissuasion attempted by the neireids and nymphs that rested by, Phaethon shook his head vehemently.

“The sun is meant to rise. Does it matter who drives it?” Phaethon argued, his words drowning in the heedless pleas of the nymphs.

That said, the son undaunted the reins, then smote the winged courser’s sides as they bounded forth on the void and cavernous vault of air.

‘Drive the sun toward tomorrow, dear son.’ Whispered the sky. ‘Deliver the rays, turn thy chariot.’

The first part is steep, one that the cavalries found hard to mount – in mid-heaven is it the highest, where a fleet of a glance down to the bottomless sea and land would cause friction in the son’s heart, adrenaline as Phaethon paws himself nearer to the chariot’s edge.

The sky rushes endlessly, spinning and carrying the distant stars in a swift, circular path. Phaethon moves against this flow, and the momentum does not waver him as do the force of the wind, riding opposite to the heaven’s rapid motion.

Imagine one is given this chariot: what would you do?

Could you resist the turning of celestial poles so that the speed of the vast sky does not yet sweep thy away?

Perhaps you picture groves, cities upon opulence, temples filled with rich offerings.

Yet this path is full of dangers. Phaethon weaves the reins of the mythical beasts of the chariot around his wrist, tightening it. The proud horses themselves are much a challenge.

But Phaethon did not steer awry, for he had to face the unending gates of Janus, the scales that upended his hold on the mythical power from Tantalon, cruel Oronyx’s time undoings, preserving Georios and the earth’s crash, drowning ocean of Phagousa, completed with drunken revelries.

Among that, what stood in his way were too, was the sky he attempted to mount, Aquila’s domain unfaithful and relentless. The branches that overturned under his feet, blessing of Cerces - the cruel Mnestia’s butterfly wings, raging Nikador and lion’s jaw, peaceful Thanatos but cruel death, and schemes of trickery woven by Zagreus’ giggly bubbles.

And in the end, he too, had to face himself.

For long as he had his hands on the reins of the chariot, he was pulled over by an impending force that lulled him sideways, upwards, and below, until the reins had snapped out of his mortal grip and the horses carrying the chariot went askew, panic seeped in their eyes as they kicked and trawled in the sky.

He lost control of the reins, and sent the horses too high, too low, and finally out of the grip of his hands.

Then, the son who born to shine crashed the sun into the ground, wrapped in the embrace of the merciful Georios.

“I failed.” Whispered the son as he fell, eyes glued to the chariot now without a driver. “Forgive me, chariot – for even the brilliance of I cannot contain thy.”

But he refused to give up. Amphoreus needed sun to overturn these darker nights, so Phaethon drove his hands up, and created something: freedom.

So, in Phaethon’s last wishes, did the chariot transform into a figure.

“Though greatly he failed,” Spoke the chariot. “More greatly he dared.”

Kephale then, was borne from the remains of Phaethon, and the chariot merged together with him – marking the sun device that is carried on Kephale’s shoulder.

– Citizens of Okhema notice that during the 7th month, the month of Freedom, the dawn burned brighter, and something, among the shape of a figure, had slightly indented onto the east side of the dawn device.

⸝⸝ 𖤓𖤓𖤓

LOOP 33,550,336.

Phainon awoke to a dawn – the yellow wheat lightly shuffled below his body, his tousled snow-white hair shambling across the surface of something soft, cyan-like eyes adjusting to the weight of Kephale’s protection. It smells faint of cinnamon and baked bread – the piquancy of a welcoming arm to his awaken.

“You’re awake.” A voice ushered him woke, gentle and soft-spoken. You whispered above his face, akin to a likening of breeze that embraced him gently, the forbearing resonance only threatened to lull the young boy asleep yet again.

Phainon smiled, nuzzling his head deeper into your lap. “I am.”

You giggled at his childishness, sleep still clinging to the crevices of his newly awakened state as you pepper kisses on his forehead. “Wake up, silly. You’ve been sleeping for so long, my leg’s gone numb.”

Phainon all but offered a crooked grin, laughing softly as your lips met his face. “5 more minutes, I don’t think I wanna get up yet.”

“The things you demand,” You huffed, poking the top of his head. “I’ll forgive it this once.”

Kephale’s dawn now burned even brighter.

A█NOMA█LY DETEC█ED – COMMENCING … .. ..

THE TRAIL█BLAZER R R S — UNSPECI█FIED DATA , , , , . . . WAR█NIGN !!!! DESTRUCTI–

NOTES:

- this is very badly written, hats off to you if you noticed that! By the end of the fic, there were several plot holes and paradoxes, as well a recurring ideas in the beginning that didn't make a comeback - that's because of how burnt out i was, and honestly i was sick of trying to keep writing, nevertheless, i didn't want to gatekeep this idea so i hope you still liked it for all its flaws. - the basic idea of this fic was that love grows teeth and is like sin. I had a LOTT of usage for grief and mourning, and how that genuinely ruins a person from the inside out. Added on to that, I wanted to convey that love, as pure and unbinding, is also harsh and aggressive. - I described in an excerpt that Phainon was like a 'wheel of fire' - this motif specifically is used as a reference to Ixion, a greek figure. It's a dramatical device applied to a protagonist a tragedy (i.e. a hero) and aims to provoke catharsis and sympathy from the audience when the hero falls from grace. - Orpheus and Eurydice are a tragic greek couple, an amazing myth, by the way, there's a whole musical for it (which you should definitely check out called Hadestown :)) Basically, they symbolize themes of love, loss, trust, and the limits of human power against imitable death - much like what i tried to convey with the myth at the end! It's the fact that when mortals try to wield divine power, they fail despite all. - There was this equilibrium I tried to create between humanity and divinity, and I marked them both with flaws and strengths. This is based off of the Ancient Greek's own beliefs and views of the greek gods and how they worshipped them, but I also HAD to emphasize that even without the existence of the divine, humanity would still prevail because we're fundamentally human. - The morse code in the middle of the dialogue (which was used as a commentary break and literary polysyndeton and verisimilitude) meant 'HUMANITY', highlighted by reader's character that I tried to shape into the concept of finite, and Phainon's character as infinity. I potrayed the lost of humanity as divine, as you aren't really human once you lose the core of what makes you 'human', then you are a substandard category that falls to either monster or divine - phainon is both. - In the first stone slate, I mentioned the 'divine/hero' (phainon) as a figure with sheeps (aka lambs of gods, a sacrificial animal, and also white purity - yang) paired with the number 42 which represents 'Answer to the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything' - while the 'mortal' (reader) is seen with crows (symbolism for death and transformation, black puddles, yin) and the number 13, which is a bad omen, but also is a good sign of transformation so it is ambiguous (much like reader's 'anti-hero' stature) - I tried to juxtaposition good memories with bad ones, as well as confuse yall by mixing memories that contradicted to represent the human mind in processing memories, and especially one unstable and mourning - such as Phainon. - There are a few psychology concepts implemented in several parts (from a fellow psych student), such as from Lygus, who is the researcher - he has researcher bias, which means he interprets the outcome based on his own hypothesis (which is irontomb emergence) and Phainon and the whole amphoreus to him, is simply a case study. The independent variable is those close to Phainon and reoccurring cycles, and the dependent variable is his levels of sanity after said cycles. These terms are qualitative and idiographic if you were curious - want to read more notes? (because this took FOREVER TO WRITE) check this out: NOTES

❝ it's never over, all my blood for the sweetness of her laughter. it's never over - she is the tear that hangs inside my soul forever. ❞

#hsr drabbles

Trending Tags

Recently Viewed Tags

#hsr drabbles