Author notes: Yeah, well, I don't know what this is. A look at Rock in an abstract way, I guess... kinda disturbing really.

Oh yeah. Metropolis isn't mine. R+R please!

Thanks to reviewers Moro Stagsleap, Rocker Baby, Kenichi's gal, Kaitourei, Lovely Elf Kurumi, and Cat's meow. Love you guys.



Prince of nothing

***********

/Mommy Daddy watch me I can fly/

Once upon a time, there was a prince in a castle- It was up in the clouds and the glass front lit it up like diamonds. He was happy with his mother and father, King and Queen of the realm, who loved him very much.

Then, when the prince was only four years old, a dragon ate his kingdom. It came in the shapes of men with guns and machines that spat fire and debris, airships dropping bombs and the muffled screams of the terrified people.

He saw the king and queen die in front of him, spattering him with crimson blood from head to foot. He hid in the debris until the men went away.

/I own this place this beautiful place of twisted metal and warped glass/

The little boy became prince of a new kingdom, one of metal struts and broken-glass skies. He forgot about the king and queen except as an ache he didn't know how to fill.

A year in the kingdom of shattered dreams went by before they found him, a little boy living there among the debris, cut hands and feet from a year of glass. He was kidnapped away from his throne and given to the king of the mechanical city as a plaything for the princess of mechanicals.

/It frightens me this clockwork of machines this world of metal wings and glass souls/

The king made the boy a prince once again, the Prince of Mechanicals. He was seven and he dressed in red to hide the marks that came with living. He played with the golden-haired princess in the palace, getting in the way of courtiers and guards. He hid from the mechanical servants that lived here, they reminded him of the dragons of his nightmares.

One day when he was ten years old, the prince saw the dragons come again and steal the Princess of mechanicals away. He tried to stop the dragon, but he was only ten years old and he wore red to hide the blood.


/don't leave me don't leave me i'll drown again/

He was eleven and the King hated him for his daughter's death-

/daddy forgive me i need you to love me/

He was thirteen and the King wouldn't forgive him and trained him to use a gun-

/why won't you care daddy why do you do this/

He was fifteen and the leader of almost-criminals in the King's name-

/It hurts-/

He was sixteen and the King made a Mechanical princess, the princess of Mechanicals' replacement. She could not be allowed to exist, she was wrong and strange and a dragon just like the rest-

/Daddy why do you love her why don't you love me she's not real she's not real she's not real-/

He was sixteen and the King exiled the prince from his realm, leaving him to become the prince of empty streets and empty hearts.

/Why/

He tried- tried so hard-

/Why don't you/

He climbed the tower of glass, the citadel of the King of mechanicals-

/Why don't you love me/

He saw the room where the mechanical princess was connected to the world and the prince-

/it hurts daddy/

For the first time, the prince wore black, and it didn't hide the red. The king was attacked by the mechanical things and the prince saw the red button through the red haze of red light-

He pressed it and there was a second of silence and he half-smiled through the pain and he realized that he had never been a prince and was nothing- The prince of nothing-

/look at me look at me daddy I can fly-/