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Seething, burning rage courses through your every vein as you press onward. He will not stop at anything, and neither will you. After everything he did to you, after everything he did to everyone, there is no world where you can stop. Not until you see his head torn from his body, his blood seeping out, his heart ripped from his chest with your bare hands. You want him to hurt, you want him to bleed, you want him dead.
Your name is the PROSPITIAN MONARCH and, though you are exhausted from years of chasing after Jack Noir, you will never stop fighting for vengeance.
Not with the glimpses of your fellows you catch out of the corner of your eye each and every time you slow down. Not when you can see the blood on your hands when you squint. Not when you know just how much pain he caused.
So you chase after him. The one who did this. The one who killed them all, who killed the people you loved over and over and over again, who used your duties and responsibilities to trick you into working alongside him. And every time you see another one of your fellows out of the corner of your eye, the fire within you burns just a little bit brighter.
Who they appear as changes from time to time. Sometimes it’s the Windswept Questant, guiding your sword in clean arcs; calling out when he slashes back so you can dodge out of his way; pointing out the flaws in his defense. Sometimes it’s the Writ Keeper, whispering gentle assurances in your ear; pulling you back so a fresh wound can scab over; listing off names of the soldiers you got killed.
Most of the time, it’s the Armaments Regent.
Every time you see him, it is another strike to your heart. Every single time you catch a glimpse of his form out of the corner of your eye, the terror and heartbreak and anger comes rushing back in full force.
With each appearance, his form is ever so slightly different. When you have the upper hand he’s cheering for you with that bright, snarky smile you hold so dear. When you’re on the backfoot he wears the first uniform you met him in, moves in the same arcs that Jack Noir will, telegraphs his attacks so that you can block them effectively. Each form is heartwrenching in its love for you, in the life he will never get to live, in the world he wanted to build alongside you and the Wayward Vagabond.
The worst of these visions, though, are the moments where you lag behind in the chase. The moments where you’re too slow, and he appears just out of your line of sight. In those moments, you can see the blood seeping out of his throat. In those moments, you are reminded of just how much you failed him.
If you had been just a little bit faster, maybe you could have saved him. If you had been just a little bit less naive, maybe you could have saved them all.
Every time any of them appear, you grow more resilient. Every time one of them appears, you push forward that tiny bit more. Every time one of them appears. you are reminded of why you have to do this, even when it feels so hopeless, even though the two of you are seemingly so evenly matched.
That doesn’t mean they don’t cause blurred vision and poorly controlled breaths, though. Whenever you see them, whenever you see him, you can’t help but to beg for them to leave you alone. Please, please, are you not doing enough? You have given everything, have become that which you hate so deeply, have abandoned your personhood to avenge them— and yet they are not satisfied, are not pacified, will not cease their demands of you as you fight your way through an endless battle.
It’s so cold, in the vast expanse of space.
The battle goes on. It goes on, and on, and on, a seemingly never-ending loop of chasing and cutting and biting.
Three years pass over the course of an eternity. You take no rests, no breaks, no moments of respite. You don’t remember who you were, not really, not after so long being awake and fuelling yourself with hatred.
And then, all too soon and yet all too late, the fight is over. You can take the ring off, can free yourself of the visions it haunts you with, can let yourself move forward. Together, with the Waygone Vincture at your side, you destroy the symbols of everything that broke. The form you fought for vengeance in, the war he fought in, the horrors that took everything from both of you— they’re all gone, now.
It has been three days from the dawn of the world you inherited. No progress has been made on your new home, not yet— instead, you have spent much of your time merely cataloguing those who made it out. How can you build a world without knowing who it’s being built for, after all?
The Wholehearted Vanguard’s blueprints will be invaluable, but only once you know where to begin.
Today, you found out that he didn’t die. That Jack Noir lives on, guided by Ms. Paint. You are not ashamed to admit that you pulled your sword on him— a gift from the Hero of Time when he noticed you moving to draw a weapon you didn’t have; a quiet recognition of the heartbroken ways in which the two of you carry the same echoes of violence and dependence.
Ms. Paint stopped you from killing him where he stood. She claimed responsibility over him, insisted that she would keep him out of trouble and push him to be an upstanding citizen. Against your better judgement, you agreed to leave him under her watch.
Enough blood has been shed. If she can keep him in line, no matter how much the failure to avenge your people wears on your soul, your world can not begin with more killing.
That does not mean you have to be alright with it. The decision weighs on you, heavy and suffocating and isolating. It was your duty to kill him. You failed, not only once but twice in doing so. Guilt and grief wash over you again, the high of finally being free from the game that dictated your lives replaced with the agonizing reminder of how much was lost along the way.
You are no company, not right now.
You leave the small encampment that the Wholehearted Vanguard set up, sword drawn as you move to cut back foliage in the nearby forest. It’s at least some form of productivity, some way to let out the pain that’s settled itself in your chest once more, some progress on building your new home.
The physical movements of cutting back branches and vines aren’t all that different from the attacks you’d performed once upon a time. It’s all too easy to fall back into the mindset of the battle, to let time pass you by as you exist in a fugue state somewhere between reality and the past.
And then, as you cut back another layer of foliage, you see him.
He’s standing there, in a clearing just outside your reach, staring directly at you. There’s something more real about him, here, as he stares at you, as the light catches on the scar wrapping around his throat.
Your sword drops out of your hand.
He was supposed to be gone. You’d thought— he was supposed to be gone. You haven’t seen him, haven’t seen any of them, not since the rings went into the volcano. You’d thought you were free of his echo haunting your worst moments, thought your mind would finally let him rest—
You’re yelling, you realize, as you step into the clearing. Yelling at him, asking him why he’s shown back up now of all times, begging him to tell you why. Did you not avenge him properly? Did you not create a world where you and the Wholehearted Vanguard can live peacefully? What does he want from you, this apparition of someone you once loved so much— why won’t he leave you alone?
Why won’t he leave you alone?
Tears spill out over your carapace as you stand there, shaking and exhausted, faced with the memory of your dearly beloved Acopic Reqiuem.
He steps forward and reaches for your face. When you jerk back, he shifts to instead take your hand in his own, looking up at you with- with love, and adoration, and warmth that you can’t help but feel you don’t deserve. Warmth that doesn’t spill over to his body, the hand that holds you cold and numb. Cold, numb, and tangible.
It hits you, then. He’s here. He’s been here, been following you this whole time, been watching over you and protecting you and guiding you throughout the entire three years’ battle.
The rage falls out from under you, leaving nothing but a desperate plea in its wake. You cling to his hand, staring him in the eyes and begging, begging for him to stay. Please, please, stay here with you and the Wholehearted Vanguard, stay here and be a part of the world you are creating.
He looks up at you with the softest expression you’ve ever seen him wear. The Acopic Requiem was always so loud, so abrasive in his work— it almost doesn’t look like him, now that his face wears love and pity and heartbreak instead. He reaches up to hold your face once more with his free hand, and this time you lean into it, relishing the fact that he’s here, that you can touch him.
He whispers out that he can’t stay with you, his Pallid Monody.
Your heart crumbles.
He can’t stay, he explains, because he doesn’t belong here. Because he’s not alive, he doesn’t have a life to live. His claws wipe the tears away from your carapace, rub gentle circles in the back of your hand, as he leads you to sit next to him.
He can’t stay. But he can talk to you, just this one last time. As he speaks, you can feel the way he imbues every word with love, with trust, with faith in both you and the Wholehearted Vanguard. He tells you that he’s proud of you both, of the world that you’re planning, of the future you’re creating. Of how happy he is that both of you made it to a happy ending.
You’re hit with an image, in the back of your mind, of you and the Wholehearted Vanguard as the brightest spots in his life. He loved you, loves you, more than you could ever have realized.
Your free hand reaches up to hold the hand he has on your face, hoping beyond hope that holding him there will stop him from disappearing.
It is clear now, as he tells you that none of what happened was your fault, that he looks at you and the Wholehearted Vanguard as heroes. More than that, even. He insists that you could never do wrong, that he trusted you to mold him into something new, something that would protect and love and follow you and your partner to the end of the universe if you asked him to.
How could he have so much faith in you, you ask, moving your hand to touch the scar over his throat.
He laughs.
In a moment, you’re dragged into a tight hug, your face buried in his shoulder as he pulls you close. It wasn’t your fault, he repeats, and you’re hit with a reminder of the forgiveness you and the Wholehearted Vanguard offered him; of the forgiveness you’d agreed to take on for yourself.
Jack Noir lives on. It’s not fair, it will never be fair, but it can be alright.
All too soon, his form starts to waver. He begins to fall apart, tiny bits of his body drifting away into the air as he offers nothing more than a sad smile. As he says that he loves you, that he believes in you, that your world is beautiful, that he can’t wait to see you again someday.
You reach for him, pull at the edges of his already fading body, desperate to keep him here. No, you say, no, you won’t say goodbye— he can’t leave, not yet, he has to stay—
He wipes your tears away again, gentle and awkward-sweet the same way he was when you first met him, when he first tried to court you.
Your hands move to hold his face, as the rest of him dissipates into the air. As you lose your grip on his body, because his body is no longer there, because he’s right: he can’t live here, not in this world, not in this reality. He died, and though he does not blame you for it, the consequences will forever be a part of your life.
You tell him you love him.
For the first time, you get to say goodbye before someone leaves you.
The last thing he says to you before he’s gone forever is that he had best not see you or the Wholehearted Vanguard again for a long, long time. The last thing you say to him is a choked out laugh, cut through a heartbroken sob.
And then you are alone in the clearing. It’s just you, your thoughts, and a pile of caution tape that lays where he once stood.
You don’t move, not for a long time. Instead, you curl in on yourself, reaching out to take the last remnant of the Acopic Requiem and hold it close. Time passes you by, though you aren’t sure exactly how much. For the first bit you cry, ugly and overpowering and exhausting, but soon enough you’re just... numb. A good kind of numb, you think, a melancholy sort of heartbreak and sadness and closure, but numb nonetheless.
When you left the encampment to blow off steam, it was early afternoon. When you come back to your senses, finally in control of your body once more as you push through that numbness, the light has shifted to something golden-warm.
Sunset, then, most likely. You pull the caution tape to your chest, just over your heart, and whisper out a quiet thank you to the air around you.
It’s quiet for a long moment. Silent, even; unnaturally so.
Space was silent too, aside from the sounds of your breathing and the clashing of the swords. You like this silence better, a warm sort of silence that lets you sit, that lets you exist and let your emotions take over.
The spell is broken when someone calls your name— the Wholehearted Vanguard, most likely —with a sense of urgency, of worry, of care.
You stand up, slow and steady, and tie the caution tape around your chest in the same sort of sash that your partner once wore. It’s a temporary measure, of course, for ease of transportation to ensure it does not get damaged while you move through still-untamed forest.
There is a life for you to live. A life he wanted you to live, a life you want to live. There are people who need you, people who are worried about you, people who are depending on you.
The Wholehearted Vanguard calls out for you once more, their distress coming across more strongly this time.
You call out in response, pick up the sword you’d dropped in your shock, and leave the clearing behind. Your future awaits, and this time you think you’re ready to take it in stride. Not as a monarch, or as an agent of vengeance, but as yourself.
The Prime Mailperson has a nice ring to it, you think.