AN: This is basically going to be a history of Ooo, from the Mushroom War on, mostly from Marceline's POV, but also from Simon and PB's and a few other minor characters. I may divide it into a few fics depending on how much response the first few chapters get. Let me know what you think! I hope you enjoy.
(ALSO, FOR NOW, THIS STORY IS NOT RELATED AT ALL TO SING OR DENIAL TIME)
Part One: Darkness
Chapter One: Marceline and the Edge of Nothing
It was like surfacing from a dark pool of water.
Everything was black. She heard muffled screaming, explosions, booms and bumps. Something jostled her. Still she could see nothing. She opened her mouth to shout, but she felt cotton balls being shoved down her throat. She tried to move her limbs. They moved so slowly, she was drowning in honey, she was drowning, she was dying.
And then, light, and air.
And all the sound, deafening in its intensity.
She opened her mouth wide. Breathing hurt. Breathing burned.
She coughed. She tentatively moved her limbs. Something was restraining her. Something warm. Something strong.
She twisted around, wriggling to find purchase. Her hand brushed something wet and sticky. Her other hand tangled in something like hair.
Hair. Blank blue eyes. Open mouth. Blood everywhere. A woman in her late twenties was bent around Marceline, as if she were protecting her, shielding her.
She was dead.
She was Marceline's mother.
Marceline did not scream. She did not cry. She lifted each of her mother's fingers separately, moved her stiffening arms aside, climbed out of her vise-like grip. She stood alone as hell fell down around her.
The walls of her mother's apartment were gone. The building was crumbling. The furniture was on fire. The cat was crushed beneath a fallen refrigerator. Everything was red and black, wet or burnt. The broken television showered sparks on everything, lending an eerily celebratory lighting to the scene.
And her mother lay in between the couch and the television. She lay curled into the fetal position, mouth open in a scream, scared. She did not look at peace. She did not look asleep.
Marceline stumbled to the edge of the room, where the destroyed wall had given way to a sheer ledge, three floors above the ground. Her small fingers twisted together in front of her. Her sharp teeth bit into her lip, drawing blood that dried up and disappeared moments later.
She did not want to jump. She did not have a choice.
Something crackled and collapsed behind her, and she fell forward with a screech.
It hurt when she hit the ground. She cried then. For a few moments, she could not move. Her bones ached. Her skin stung.
But she was okay. She would be okay. She was always okay.
She dragged herself to her feet. She looked around her. The world was ending.
Bombs fell, fire showered down from the sky, planes crashed, children burned to death. Animals screamed like people, people squealed like animals. Smoke curled around everything. No one paid any attention to the little girl standing alone at the edge of nothing.
She took a step forward. Hesitated. And then her legs gave out beneath her. She collapsed. She curled up. She cried. She sobbed. She sobbed for so long that the screaming stopped and the fires burned out around her. The smoke began to dissipate, and all the people either died or evacuated the city. She was left all alone in the wreckage. Still she cried. She imagined her mother's arms around her, not stiff and unyielding, but soft, but pliable. She cried.
She cried until she fell asleep.
While she slept, she dreamt. While she dreamt, she cried some more. She cried, "Daddy."
She slept.
When she finally awoke, it was dark. It was not a suffocating dark. It was a comforting dark. It was a dark without fire. It was a dark without death.
She rolled on to her side and hit something. A boy lay beside her. He was older than her, around thirteen or fourteen. He was big, and round. He had dark curly hair. His eyes were closed. He had carried Marceline here and then collapsed from exhaustion.
Marceline sat up. She was cold. She was hungry.
She looked around her. She touched the ground with her fingertips. She inhaled deeply.
Everything around her was damp and cool. She thought she was in a cave.
She wanted her mother. She wanted her father. She didn't have anybody.
She didn't have anybody but the boy lying beside her.
The boy awoke a few hours later to find Marceline at the mouth of the cave, watching the sun rise. He scrambled to his feet.
The sky was a myriad of pinks and oranges ripping through the clouds of smoke hanging over the city. Planes streaked through the colors. Lines of soldiers marched down the streets, searching for survivors, moving dots pushing through the destruction.
The boy put his hand on Marceline's shoulder so she knew he was there. She didn't jump. She looked up at him with a blank expression. He was much taller than her.
"Can you talk?" he said. She was very young. She looked to be three or four.
Marceline looked away from him and didn't respond.
The boy sighed. "Figures. Oh well. We need to eat."
He bent down and picked Marceline up, holding her to his chest. "My name is Emile."
He picked his way carefully from the cave, cautiously looking around for threats. "I know you can't understand me."
Emile followed a path that led away from the city. "But I'm lonely."
He set Marceline down on a boulder. "Stay here," he said sternly.
She looked at him.
He turned away, bent over to examine the plants lining the path. He picked up various green things, sniffed them, helpless and hungry.
He felt a tap on the back of his calf. He looked down. The girl stood behind him, holding a stale, dirty piece of bread. She had found it in the undergrowth.
Emile smiled. "You can have that." He turned back to his work as if he knew what her were doing.
He felt another tap, this time more persistent. Marceline held the bread out to him again.
"No," he said, and turned away again. "You need it more."
The next time Marceline tried to get his attention, it was less of a tap, and more of a punch. "What?" he said explosively, irritated now.
Marceline held the bread out to him. Then she pointed behind her. "Food," she said quietly. Her voice was small, faraway. She sounded as if she were speaking on a phone with a bad connection.
"You can talk," Emile said. He walked to the place the girl was pointing at. "I don't-" he began, but stopped himself. A pile of food, scraps mostly, half-eaten things, lay hidden beneath leaves and plants and flowers and dirt.
"This must belong to someone else," Emile said. A pang shot through his stomach. The girl looked at him.
Emile twisted his mouth. For a few seconds, both children stood there silently, staring at the food.
"Take as much as you can carry," he finally said. "Take as much as you can carry."