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Grief comes easy, after everything.
As the final hit lands and the universe slows, steady rain falls from the clouds that gathered to watch.
It turns the desert into an oasis, a promise of tears that flood the area, filling in the craters that a similar promise of death once made. The universe’s sorrow pouring from the skies for 13 days; 24 hours for every player claimed into its soil, bodies lost in an explosion of items and experience.
The desert is wet. It keeps Grian indoors- grounded. It keeps his wings pinned close to his back and his feet firmly on the ground. It keeps him from seeing the beginning of the blooms.
When Grian sleeps, he dreams of flowers. The offering of lilacs and poppies, he lets himself believe, kept him in the desert, pretending it was sand and not petals in his shoes. He dreams of how his teammate looked, bashful, bouquet in hand. Grian dreams of the hesitant way his ally asked him if they could stay friends. Grian laughs. He dreams that he says that he still owes him his first life, disregarding the rules etched onto his very heart. After all, it's not Grian’s anymore.
The dream rewinds. Grian dreams there was water at the bottom of the ravine, catching the inevitable fall, even if it meant there were never any flowers. When he wakes, it's to the thought that he would be better off with less to grieve.
The desert smells wet. Grian doesn’t look outside. He digs down into the floorboards of the sandcastle, away from the weeping sky.
When Grian thinks, it's about a grave. Shallow. Without a casket, Grian wonders if his ally will be washed away by the rain. He wonders if it matters. No amount of rain could wash away the blood that stained the sand, at least not now.
Grian empties his shoes. Nothing falls out.
The desert feels wet.
It's the way the sandstone of his base feels cold to the touch, it’s the chill that settles into his bones even as the sun waits clearly and patiently outside. It's the way Grian swipes up to his face, sweater brushing against his still moist face.
The desert feels lonely.
It’s the weight in Grian’s stomach, It’s the tightness in his throat, that tells him that there is not a single place that will absolve him of the feeling.
It's 8 days after the rainfall ceases that Grian smells it. A sickening floral scent that forces its way into his base and settles into every crack. It’s heady and overwhelming, soft and lush. For an insane moment, Grian clings to the memory of iron and gunpowder, suddenly so foreign.
He won’t look.
There can’t be flowers, not here. It would be sick. It would be cruel. Not here. Not here.
Not all graveyards need flowers.
When Grian digs down further to escape the smell, he remembers the first base he made.
The hobbit hole, with the flowers, the oak wood, the terracotta.
He remembers the first day, tearing down a house in the village for the materials.
He remembers going back to the village for more.
He remembers the creeper, the dark oak, and the pyromaniac whose life he stole and who he would have to repay.
He remembers trading flowers for sand.
Fleetingly, Grian wonders if the base he made all those lives ago was still intact. He grapples with the knowledge that the life he could have had amongst the flowers is not the one he grieves.
Even the stone far beneath the sand smells like flowers now.
Grian places down a bed, red, dyed with poppies. Curled in the blanket, cold and alone, there's only so much he can pretend. When he wakes up, his eyes are dry and his nose is runny. There’s no one here to call him out, to tell him it's not allergies.
It takes one more day for Grian to look outside. He accidentally breaks a sandstone wall, creating a window.
Around the desert, countless banners of color sprawl across the hills, covering the sand completely. Small pools in TNT craters serve as the only break from the vibrant assault of blooms.
Grian doesn’t stumble backwards. Grian doesn’t rush outside to look at the world that changed around him so rapidly, at the world that didn’t give him time to grieve.
He stands frozen at the window, hand clutching the corner of the block below it. He doesn’t learn forward and he doesn’t pull away.
There’s nothing to distract him. No wind to ruffle the flowers. No bees to dance around pollinating.
It’s just Grian now.
Past the rolling hills, there are no clouds.
Only the sun looks at Grian now, and Grian has no interest in looking at it.
He steps back and looks towards the only door. Only one pair of diamond boots rests against the wall, wet sand sticking to them in patches.
Grian steps into them, hand coming up to brace the wall as he stands on one foot at a time. There's no need for any other armour anymore.
He stares at the sword propped against the door, not netherite, not anymore, and walks past it.
The door opens gently, hinges not old enough yet to be covered in sand, not like the one both he and his partner had used.
Grian steps out, surveying the unfamiliar fields below him.
Nothing happens. There's no sudden movement, the wind doesn’t pick up and twirl around him. The flowers gather eerily still, as if waiting for Grian to make the first move, so he does.
A quiet calm settles in his chest, a small smile, more like a grimace, dashing across his face as he walks past where a cactus ring should be. He settles in front of a grave, staring at the flowers that surround it.
It's not poppies and it's not lilacs.
The sunflowers aren’t facing the sun; instead, they face the sandcastle and Grian, waiting for his reaction.
Grian doesn’t know what sound he makes, just that he opens his mouth. His teeth snap shut, a wild grin growing even faster than the flowers seemed to. The wind picks up, and his white wings fluff up in response. He wants to fly.
Yes, let flight be his reward for all the pain he caused on behalf of the man he stole victory from.
He leans on the grave as he slides his boots off, removing as much weight as he can. He walks towards the edge of the mountain, tossing random objects from his inventory, the flowers muffling the sound of their impact. A flying flint and steel hits the misshapen grave, making two loud clangs.
Grian’s steps slow as he meets the corner of the mountain, the sun directly in his eyes. He looks down, away from it, at the flowers below. Orange ones gather beneath him, tulips, if he had to guess. He briefly considers sitting down, enjoying the sunset, but no, he really had never been one to enjoy wasting time.
If he did, would he still have won? If they spent those nights lighting a campfire or looking at the stars like his partner had asked, would he still be around to grieve?
How unfair. How unfair.
He saw what happened to Scott, the grief of losing his stupid husband. Grian wondered if the grief he was feeling now was any similar. Scott grieved what he had. Grian grieved what he could have had. Grian wondered which was worse.
He wasn’t blind. He knew what the desert could have offered him. He knew what those flowers, what these flowers, could have meant. In another life, he wouldn’t be the one to hurt his ally; he hoped that much.
One step forward into a ravine led to a bouquet of poppies and lilacs. One step forward here, he thought, would end his grief. The final life he could give to his partner, to rid himself of the memories, he hoped that much.
It’s not like the flowers could catch his fall.