Work Text:
“What do you want,” comes the snarl, of course, when a hand knocks on the door of the otherwise isolated cabin.
The door opens, and the first thing that catches in the light of the flickering fireplace is the glint of eternal ice, sliding out in sharp spikes against pale skin.
The butterfly’s knight walks in, pauses by the door, and slides it shut, leaning against the wall. “…”
“…” The room’s resident sighs, closes their book, and sets it to the side, a trail being left behind from their eye as they turn to stare irritably at the intrusion. “What is it, knight?”
“Catch.”
And Dissent reaches out their free arm, fumbling with the heavy fabric that was suddenly thrown at them. They stare at it, then back up at the knight. “…What?”
“Put this on and follow me,” Kari instructs, before she turns and walks out of the room.
Curiously, Dissent shakes out the fabric– it’s a cloak. A warm one, well made. It’s designed to rest upon their usual garments without being too suffocating or pressing onto their restraints too much, and feels light to the touch.
Dissent shrugs on the cloak, places a pen onto the draft they were writing, and strolls out of the room.
…
Kari’s always been an expert at making rifts. Tears, in reality, with the help of her sword and a few thrown in prayers.
And Dissent is no stranger to being a traveler of the void. In all comparisons, they were actually supposed to be stronger than the other, despite the both of them sharing the same tormented soul.
Yet, somehow, Kari— the knight— was still able to easily overpower any of them.
“It’s winter where the Lady is,” Kari mutters, easily slicing a tear into the air. “And she may have visitors soon. So be vigilant, and respectful.”
“…Why are you taking me there?” Dissent questions, tilting their head slightly– as far as it would go, without whatever remained of their brain (although they doubted it existed anymore, it still hurt) touching the cross embedded in their skull.
“You’ll see,” Kari replies, cryptic as always, then reaches out a hand.
Kari is mortal. That, Dissent knows all too well. A mortal, and yet the higher being’s right hand. The knight. The trusted aide. The confidant, second only to the sponsor’s favorite charge.
Dissent doesn’t like either of them, of course. A deep, seething rage at the two of them– for having such perfect lives and throwing them away for such an impossible to reach goal. For having an interesting story that kept them alive and looked over. For not being forgotten.
For not being abandoned to twist into something nonhuman.
Dissent is a world eater. They have destroyed countless universes through the simple act of crying.
Kari is a knight. A mortal one, at that, who still lives by the values of a world long gone.
They are not close.
And yet…
Both of them wear purple and teal. It is the defining colors of their sanctuary, and shows that they are to be trusted. It shows they’re on the same side.
Dissent places their gloved hand into Kari’s armored one, letting her pull them past the rift, stepping from green grass onto the softness of layers of powdered snow.
“Do you remember this?” Kari asks the moment the harsh bite of winter air hits both of their faces. “Do you remember the cold?”
A pause. Kari turns to look at the world eater she is guiding. “Do you remember home?”
“…” Dissent stiffens, jerking their hand out of Kari’s grasp. “I— it’s a far, distant memory. But there definitely wasn’t snow.”
“Of course not, we lived in California.” The knight chuckles. “There was no snow anywhere. We had to get used to this.”
And sure enough, neither of the world travelers were uncomfortable in the cold. In fact, Kari seemed at home— while Dissent was simply unaffected.
The world eater paused, thinking. “This isn’t California.”
“No.” Kari shook her head. “This is the Lady’s world. California drowned itself in rising oceans within the span of a year, along with other lands.”
“Because of her ascension, yes, I know.” Dissent dismissed the other, looking around. “Where are we, then?”
“Vermont,” Kari answers without hesitation. “It was the first place she found that suited her taste.”
“…And why am I here,” Dissent stressed. “Why did you bring me here? Why did you interrupt my research to drag me out here?”
Slowly, maintaining eye contact, Kari knelt down, reaching a hand down to brush aside the snow.
Armored fingers gently tightened around the stem of a pink blossom, and with one simple tug, the flower was picked from the ground.
“Do you remember home?” the knight repeated. “Do you remember the smell of the air? The light pollution? The ash? The rain, and the scorching sun?”
“Of course I remember,” Dissent snapped. “Of course I do. Those were my memories too. I don’t just forget because I’m… this now.”
“But you treat yourself like you are,” Kari points out.
Dissent flinches at that, their eye flicking away to look at anywhere but the knight’s face.
“Since you’ve been here, not once have I seen you cry. Not once have I seen you do anything but be angry or blank,” Kari continued, watching each statement hammer itself into the world eater. “And yes, these research projects seem to be doing well for you.”
She held the flower out. “But denying your own humanity isn’t going to get rid of the suffering. It’s not going to get rid of the memories. It’s not going to get rid of the damage. You can’t heal if you constantly run away from yourself.”
Slowly, hesitantly, Dissent reached out, plucking the bloom from Kari’s waiting hands. “…It’s really none of your business.”
“My business is to make sure all of my Lady’s wards have equal opportunity to heal,” the knight replies smoothly. “I observe a lot more than you believe. An open space and the freedom to choose without consequences. That’s what you need. Somewhere where you can run, and hide, and roll, and climb, without having to fear the result of not being the best.”
“…” Dissent blinked, realization setting in. “You’re asking me to play in the snow.”
“I’m asking you to play in the snow,” Kari confirms with a small smile. “Like it or not, you’re still a teenager. A heavily traumatized one, but a teenager nonetheless. While you’ve done unforgivable things in the name of your own survival, you’ve also irreparably had your childhood torn from you.”
“…”
There’s a hand on Dissent’s shoulder. “You don’t have to do it now. I just needed to bring you here to show that you have options. Once spring comes, you could frolic. Or find leaf piles to jump in when fall arrives. Something small. Something of your own will. It’ll do you some good. Get you out of your isolation.”
“…” The world eater looks down at the flower still pinched in their hand, stem crooked from the force.
“…I haven’t seen snow in years,” they finally admitted, quietly. “Or… breathed fresh air. Or really… done anything other than running. I wanted– I wanted to go to MIT. Political science.”
Kari says nothing.
“And–” Dissent continues, hesitating. “And Christmas was coming up. And I wanted to— I wanted that really silly pajama set, but it was really stupid so I just kept hinting at it, and–”
They paused, chuckling. “I know they got it for me. They actually got it for me, I just– I never got to open it. I saw the packaging and I saw the bag. I never got to open it.”
Another pause. “I… accepted that I’d never be able to do any of those things again. I was so.. convinced that I’d done something wrong. I was so convinced that the torment was my mind’s way of punishing me for everything I’d done. I thought I was stuck in my final moments. Replaying every guilt and everything I did. Over and over under the disguise of a video game.”
Kari still said nothing, of course, but her expression softened.
“And—” Dissent swallowed, gathering their thoughts. “And the worst part was I thought I deserved it. I— I thought I did something wrong. Why me? Why’d I have to go out like that? Why’d I have to– why did I have to die? It was either karma or pure chance. And I hated— hated thinking my life was just worthless enough for it to be chance.”
Silence fell between the two of them, occasionally interrupted by the stinging breeze of winter air and the soft snowfall that gathered on their shoulders.
“I was eighteen,” Kari says, to which Dissent blinks, looking up in surprise. “I was eighteen, and volunteering at Dad’s work– you know the one, yeah? A box fell on me. They didn’t stack it right.”
She paused. “Blunt force trauma. And there was too much internal bleeding. Hemorrhage. I died three days later. Woke up in that alleyway with the banana peel. Some guy was staring at me.”
Kari’s eyes seemed to glaze over as she spoke. “For the longest time, I thought there was someone out there who laughed at my demise. I was angry. Angry, and terrified. There was no hero of my story. I don’t think there ever was. I couldn’t be the hero to myself, I had to… I had to grow up first.”
Her gauntleted hand patted Dissent’s shoulder one more time before dropping. “I grew up too fast. And now I can’t go back. Don’t make the same mistake I did.” Kari sighed. “You are years older than you were, but your soul was in stasis the entire way. You still have time. You still have a chance. Heal with everything you can.”
Another pause.
“You never deserved anything that happened to you.”
“None of us did,” Dissent muttered, to which Kari nodded in agreement.
“None of us did. So take a breath, and think it through.”
Her expression faded back into its passive stare. “What do you want to do right now?”
“…” Dissent inhaled. Exhaled.
“I think I’ll lay in the snow.”
“A first step,” Kari nodded. “That’s good.”
“Will you…” Dissent hesitated, their hand moving over to pick at the cloak covering their shoulders. “Will you uh. Do it with me?”
Kari’s expression softened again, and she nodded a second time.
“Yeah. Of course.”