A little longer than Hands of the Clock. My longest oneshot ever. Shan't add any more to the word count. Title inspired by Fire Emblem.
Cogs of Destiny
…love makes the world go round…
…
"The Gatekeeper is the only being in the world that can remove and edit sections of time. It takes prisoner all who try to bargain with it and fail to pay, and turns them into pirates," Windfire absently read aloud, under the sunlit blue over Henesys, a legend book in his hands. "Legend has it that the Gatekeeper was once a girl in charge of taking care of the Clocktower."
By his side, Oceanlight, a Crusader, listened. She had been his companion for years, since their meeting in Henesys Park. It had been the most ordinary of meetings; a day so much like this one.
On the bank of the river by Henesys, the sun hung low in the sky. Windfire skimmed stones across the water, bored in the late afternoon sunlight. His bow was hung over his shoulder, his arrows in a quiver on his back.
As he flung stones repeatedly over the river, he became aware of someone watching him.
"Who's there," he called, turning.
The girl was beside him soon. "You training in the Hunting Ground?"
He nodded. "Stopping for a little break," he replied. "I'm Windfire. What 'bout you?"
"Oceanlight," she answered confidently.Then her eyes brightened with an idea. "You know, I was thinking if you could come, um…travel with me. I've been going alone since my first job, you know, so…"
Windfire agreed without a thought. He wanted a companion too, and finally, he had found one.
"Look!" The bowman followed Oceanlight's gaze, and they both looked up at the sunset that was flaring out behind the trees, before their watching eyes. It was beautiful, he suddenly realised. He had never bothered to look before. But now, he saw how the rays of the sun glanced off the orange ribbon of the river, and he realised. It was amazing.
Windfire continued to read from his book. "As the Clock Spirit grew old, she was turned into a great, ugly guardian to stand guarding time itself within the Warped Path of Time."
Oceanlight cocked her head to one side, watching him. "That's sad," she replied, noting the smile in his eyes as he turned to look at her. "Why can't others edit time?"
"Says here that time, like a great clock, is kept running by a set of complex mechanisms," he read. "When one meddles with it—turns it back, forward, or stops it too many times, the mechanisms will be destroyed and time will stop. Only the Gatekeeper is able to tell when too much has been done, and stop to allow time to go back into proper course."
"Interesting, but a bit confusing…"
"The Gatekeeper was once a girl! Imagine! It says here that she fell in love before she was turned into a monster, but the Clock Spirit didn't seem to care. It's a bit…cruel, if you ask me. I wonder if the Gatekeeper still has any of the feelings she had as a human…"
The Crusader girl sighed, looking down. Windfire was always with her, wherever she went. But did he know that she was in love with him? Oceanlight continued to watch the grass as it swayed, just beyond her reach as she lay on the field, chin propped up on her arms. Did he know…would he ever? Did he love her as well?
Windfire looked on at Oceanlight's beautiful brown hair. They had known each other for seven years already. But how much he wished he could tell her the truth of his feelings, how much more she actually meant to him than she thought, how she was more than a mere friend…
There was an uneasy silence between the two, and finally, both sighed at the same time. Windfire glanced up at Oceanlight first, who looked back, smiling.
"Windfire? You know…that—we—I…I feel…"
The Ranger looked up. "I love you," he suddenly said. Oceanlight left him no time to take in the fact that he had just admitted his deepest secret. She took him into her arms and hugged him, grip so tight he thought she would never let go. His book lay on the ground beside him, all but forgotten.
"And I thought you didn't," she answered with so much emotion in her voice it startled him. The sky, the grass and the wind seemed to rejoice around them. "Promise you won't ever go back on that, alright!"
He smiled. "No, I won't," he replied. "And as long as you're with me, I'll do all I can for you! I promise. I promise I won't ever let you be in pain, or in sadness…"
Oceanlight smiled, and laughed. He knew that that image, of her beautiful face, that lyrical laugh, would remain in his memory forever. She loves me. She really loves me.
A roar resounded, through the stars, it seemed, as their deadly enemy, the god of the Dead Mine, raised its arms for another strike, crumbled, but just as powerful as it had been at the start of the battle. They, on the other hand, were weak with pain, burns and scars that it had inflicted. They looked on at the huge monster, struggling to stay on their feet.
No wonder it was called the god of the Dead Mine. Zakum had almost killed them already, and there was no way out for them, even with four teammates, and the power of their combined skills.
"Come on, let's finish it!" the Hermit in their party roared. A fresh barrage of attacks left his hands in the form of flaming stars. Together, the rest joined in.
Windfire could not have seen it coming. He had only noted the body of the monster, and readied a strike with a diamond arrow from his bow, too intent on hitting his target in its mouth, to see the rise of black around him. To hear the roar of wind that was not wind, but colder. To feel the grip of the darkness as it wrapped its cursed fingers around his existence.
He froze in his steps. The curse was shrieking through his blood, his ears, rendering his entire being unmoving and dead. Behind, he heard the cry of anguish from his beloved, as she shot forward to take on the monster, to cut off the spell once and for all.
But it was dying in him, he could feel. Shrivelling, all the skill and power he had ever own before, all he had trained to be, departing as he stood and watched…
It ended. Windfire gasped and fell upon the floor, bow lying among the jagged rocks of the fiery Zakum's prison. He reached for it, but dropped the weapon, arms too weak even to hold it up.
"Windfire!" Oceanlight raced to his side and helped him to stand. "Windfire, are you alright?"
He took the bow again and drew an arrow on its bowstring, suddenly too hard to pull. And he tried to raise the energy of Power Arrow that he had so easily drawn up before. The magic fizzed in his palms and died.
"I—I can't do it anymore…I've lost all my skills," he gasped. Oceanlight shook her head hard.
"You'll get it again!" she exclaimed, wanting to believe that. "You'll regain your skills after some rest, after this battle is over!"
But Windfire knew, without trying, that it was over. Zakum's curse had taken it all away from him, and he was as weak as a beginner, not even the power of Arrow Blow remaining in his soul or his knowledge. It was gone.
The Ranger waited in the shadows behind the rocks as the rest battled for their lives' worth. He heard every resounding crash and scream and bang, and his heart never rested, until, at last, a colossal avalanche of rocks marked the death of the El Nath Party Quest boss.
He practiced everyday. Windfire tried repeatedly to learn the basic bowman skills all over again.
It was lost. He stood in the garden and tried his bow, which he was slowly forgetting how to use. He tried, failed, tried again, and never succeeded.
Oceanlight watched through the window, watched him as he fought to regain the skills he had lived with for so long, and had suddenly lost in that battle. She watched as he threw down his arrows in anger and sat with his face in his hands, shedding tears she had never seen in his eyes before.
And her pain grew with his. It was because of her, she suddenly realized.
She could have stopped him.
She could have taken the hit in his place and taken the pain instead of him.
She could have destroyed Zakum before its curse took effect.
She could have forgotten that stupid idea of hers to go for the El Nath Party quest in the first place, never taken him to the place where it had happened, never faced that creature of the underworld, never even faced the possibility of him losing all his fighting skill…
The thoughts whirled about in her mind and flayed wounds of guilt deep into her heart, scarred her soul eternally. A hundred things she could have done for him. And she had failed to do every one, failed him. It was because of her that his powers had been destroyed. Why did he suffer? She was the one who deserved the suffering.
Through the window, Windfire's angered, exhausted cry rang out, followed by the sound of his bow clattering to the ground.
And within herself, Oceanlight felt her spirit die, fade away like a dying flower.
Oceanlight became less and less willing to live, all of a sudden. Windfire saw her skin open with self-inflicted wounds, and when he tried to stop her, she screamed. She wanted to bleed, she said. She wanted to take his pain upon herself.
"Oceanlight, you can't! I don't blame you; I know I've forgotten how to use the bow, because of the curse. But it's no reason for you to take it out on yourself! It's not your fault!"
His words were merely rustles of wind in her ears; she continued to harm herself, to make her own life a torture.
"You'll never battle again. You were once great, but you lost that greatness because of my idea. You lost all the power you once had, and I am the cause of it! I am the cause! Leave me alone to suffer as I should!"
Windfire heard her cries of pain, her moans, through the wall at night. They kept her awake, and he could only imagine the pain she was going through. Everyday, she slipped away from humanity, away from him, into the arms of pain. Why was she doing this to herself? She had gone mad. But no, Windfire didn't want to think of it that way. He still loved her dearly, and he would never say that she had gone mad.
All that pain, it was a cycle, a cycle of two who loved each other. They said that love makes the world go round, but here, it only made the pain unending, the suffering eternal between the two. His pain gave her pain. Her pain made him suffer. He was trapped, trapped by the web of their suffering.
Oceanlight, I am the one who should be sorry. I'm the one…who brought all this pain on you. I was the one…
He wanted to break off this cycle, make it stop, make all this pain end! Love gives us both pain.
I'm sure…I'm sure everything would be better if…we hadn't met, hadn't fallen in love. If we didn't even know each other. No pain for us, no anger, no regret…
Vaguely, he recalled a day in the past. That day, that joy, seemed so distant now, just an echo to him. He remembered how he had found out that day that the Gatekeeper was able to remove sections of time.
He could remove all the times they had grown to love each other more. They could remain as strangers to each other. That would prevent this from ever happening.
For a moment, something clenched tightly in his heart—no! I love her! I don't want to leave her, ever, ever…
But that would only be selfish of him. If he really loved her, he would do what was right, and give her a chance to live a life without guilt. Even if it meant that she would forget him, it didn't matter, for there would be a kind, gentle girl named Oceanlight somewhere out there in the world, a girl who could live every day with a smile on her face. He wanted that. And he didn't care if it meant a loss on his part. She would be happy.
Windfire left their home in the Korean Folk Town for the Clocktower, where the answer, the solution to all their suffering, and the start of a million questions waited.
The Gatekeeper took hostage all who tried to bargain. What made him think that it would work for him?
The questions didn't cease to pester the ex-Ranger as he stepped through the doorway into the Clocktower, completely unarmed.
The atmosphere of the place instantly engulfed him—the walls and floor glimmered with light like sunrise reflected in rippling water. Windfire ignored it all, and entered the Warped Path of Time. There was no time to sightsee.
He slipped past the monsters too easily, past the lowly clock-carrying servants that the Gatekeeper owned. But as he looked up at the pirates that sat aboard their grand ships, soaring through the shimmering air, he remembered that they had all once been human, and that they were what he would become if he failed to pay for a favour from the Gatekeeper.
"Ho, what have we here," a pirate boomed as he came through the Path. Some laughed. "Here to gamble with the Gatekeeper?" Windfire stopped and nodded truthfully, wanting to hear their opinion.
Their guffaws were powerful. "Well, boy," one said, sailing through the air like a true ship on water, sails filled with wind that he did not feel. "I was stupid like you, once. But I realised in my long time here that it's not worth the effort. Turn back, boy! There is no point trying to pay the prices that the Gatekeeper charges. You are better off a free person!"
"No." Windfire shook his head angrily and ran on.
"Don't be stupid!" Before he knew it, two blasts of heat burst past him, scalding the air. The heat was strong on his skin. "You're making a huge mistake, silly child! Turn back, turn away from that monster!"
"No," he repeated. "Not when it's f-for…someone I love. I can't let her pain go on. I must make her forget me."
At that, the pirates were silent. "What stupid things people do for love," one sighed after him. "But after all, I was a human once, and I was that stupid…Tell us, boy. Why do you so badly want someone you love to forget you?"
"She—I caused her pain. Loving me caused her pain. It's not…not right."
"Sorry…then," the great monster said, suddenly kind and understanding. "If that's so, then…"
Holding on to his intentions, holding on to his tears and his sadness, Windfire ran and left the pirates behind. He ran over the glassy, shining floor and slipped into the deepening darkness, holding only a memory of Oceanlight's smile as his guiding beacon of light.
Then he entered the final section of the Warped Path. It was darker than he could see through, and yet he knew that there was something there, ahead of him in the shadows.
He knew he was unarmed and defenceless. But he would not let fear stop him.
"Gatekeeper."
The creature veiled by shadows turned and snarled. Already, Windfire could see the bright glow of the two axes that it held in its two hands, sharper than blades of metal. They were full of magic. The light that shone from wispy, symbol-drawn suns above revealed the Gatekeeper's two rows of monstrous teeth, and the eyes sunken into its body, glowing like two ominous lights in the distance, and behind it, the row of locked gates that led into the past.
He saw a blinding flash of light and ducked down just in time to avoid the Gatekeeper's spell.
"Who dares to enter!" It was a persecution, not a question. He was already doomed, surely.
"Gatekeeper! Please, spare me, I need your powers!" Windfire found his voice harsh and dry from fear, and he backed away while the Gatekeeper advanced. "G-Gatekeeper…please…"
"NO!"
It was a scream, a scream of exasperation.
Another blast of blue light shot past him, warming his skin slightly. A third suddenly came, and he shut his eyes, knowing in that split second that his quest had ended, and that Oceanlight would be left with his loss to confront for the rest of her life.
Oceanlight…no…
He opened his eyes, miraculously complete. Then turned and saw a pirate lying before him, ship smouldering and, to his horror, body slowly turning to dust.
"Give him a chance," it said, facing the Gatekeeper. And as it said this, its voice changed, narrowed, softened. "Don't give up yet…young one." Windfire blinked tears away and looked up again, searching the scene for the figure of the pirate who had saved him, but now, all that stood in its place was a teenaged Dragon Knight, slowly fading like dust blown away by the wind. "Give him…a chance…"
Then it was gone, vanished from the Path. And Windfire knew that it—he was dead, free at last.
The Gatekeeper came towards Windfire, hovering over the ground, soundless. "What is it?" The anger in its voice made him feel frightened.
Again, he thought of Oceanlight, how she believed herself responsible for everything that had happened to him. From that, he suddenly gained the courage to speak.
"Gatekeeper, can you…remove all the times that I ever shared with Oceanlight that made me…fall in love with her?"
The monster was silent. "You are certain of this." Windfire nodded. For a moment, the Gatekeeper said nothing, as if in thought. "Then come with me. And I demand that you give me a gift, one that will mean something to me, when the job is done!" Swallowing hard, he nodded again. He didn't care if he was condemned to imprisonment, for Oceanlight. He was willing.
A coldness gathered him up all of a sudden. He felt himself fly off the ground, all his senses leave the Warped Passage, and enter a new place, colder, and even harder to understand.
Images were suddenly flocking around him, bright with sunshine or dull with rain, all whirling around him—every image of ever moment that had passed for each person in the world, in the midst of an expanse of black.
"Come." An image stopped before them, as if drawn out of a rapid river. Windfire found himself immobile as the one scene grew to surround him and the presence beside him, the Gatekeeper itself.
Slowly, he saw what was in it. Blue skies, waving grass and sunshine. He suddenly recalled it so vividly it made his throat ache with the tears he held back.
"Windfire? You know…that—we—I…I feel…"
He looked up. "I love you," the words came out suddenly. And instantly, Oceanlight came forward and embraced him.
"And I thought you didn't," she replied spiritedly. "Promise you won't ever go back on that, alright!"
"No, I won't. And as long as you're with me, I'll do all I can for you! I promise. I promise I won't ever let you be in pain, or in sadness…"
His heart thumped with pain for those words. He had made that promise so long ago, so long he had almost forgotten. She had been so happy then. He had never thought for a moment that it would all come to this, that he would have to give up their relationship for the sake of her joy…
The Gatekeeper swung its axe. He was suddenly thrown from the scene, as it was ripped into two. The air gave a clattering jerk, before time continued to run smoothly again. The shreds of that time in the past, that precious, sweet memory, flew away like petals.
That memory was finally gone.
"That is not enough. The course of events would still lead to that happening. The more of it we unravel, the harder it will be for events to progress that way again."
Windfire looked down at the ground and sighed, in too much emotional pain to hear its words.
Oceanlight, he continued to think. Oceanlight, be happy…
The scenes of the past whirled by again. Forcing himself to watch, he saw another picture come to a stop before them, and he recognized it. They were younger here. The sky of Orbis and the whirl of the clouds lit that day of adventure, when they had arrived at the shining harbour, on the other side of the sky, for the first time.
"This is so cool!" Windfire's shout rang loudly against the stone walls as they stepped off the ship, eyes full of joy the Windfire of the present could no longer remember feeling.
Oceanlight ran out onto the balcony, and the Hunter followed. "This is amazing," she whispered, as the two stood together at the wide window, feeling the wind of the clouds brush their hair back. They glanced at each other, faces alight with full joy. She was already so beautiful then.
A flash of blue cut through Windfire's sweet reminiscence, and tore him away, tore the memory apart. Time juddered slightly, before it carried on with its smooth course. He felt tears sting in his eyes as he knew that that memory was gone as well, that it had never been lived.
"Patience," the Gatekeeper said, a whisper. He suddenly felt sadness sweep through the place where they floated in nothingness, and he turned to see the guardian of the Warped Passage, face turned away. "That is…not enough yet…"
Another memory had appeared. His heart, his entire soul ached as he watched—another bright day. A sunset, a glimmering river, on the woven picture of that memory. The day it had started, the day their friendship had begun.
He skimmed stone after stone across the glassy surface of the river, disturbing it. A girl, unfamiliar then, came to stand behind him.
"Who's there."
"You training in the Hunting Ground?" Her eyes were hopeful, Windfire suddenly realized.
"Stopping for a little break," he answered. "I'm Windfire. What 'bout you?"
"Oceanlight…You know, I was thinking if you could come, um…travel with me. I've been going alone since my first job, you know, so…"
He nodded.
Then, her gasp of amazement cut the silence. "Look!"
Windfire turned, and saw the sunset. For the first time.
As the Windfire in the present looked on, he suddenly felt something within himself give way, allow the tidal wave of emotions to carry his soul away. He cried a tear, two, and they floated away like glitter in the darkness of anti-time, in which they floated now.
Goodbye. It was the end of their time together. She would forget him, and be happy. Goodbye, Oceanlight.
The creature with the axes, its huge body not moving, raised its glowing weapons in the light of the floating memories, and cut the images through as if cleaving flesh.
Time shook again, and Windfire felt as if something around him was about to fall apart, any moment. His thoughts were all a mess of no colours, now he knew that Oceanlight's memories were lost forever.
The Gatekeeper turned to him, eyes closed. Sadness rippled outward from its body as it floated there. "Sorry…Windfire," it sighed. "Sorry for all the pain this is causing you…"
Another image had come. It was not his memory, he knew.
The Gatekeeper's?
A girl stood beside a boy, her eyes shining with tears as a darkness seemed to grow around them.
This was the Gatekeeper, Windfire suddenly knew, without having to ask. This was the one she loved.
"Don't forget me," the girl gasped.
"I won't," the boy replied. Then they held each other's hands tightly, and the darkness grew to surround them, and change their forms forever.
The Gatekeeper wasted not a moment. It raised its axes up and got ready to destroy this memory that had pained it for so many years, centuries. Its axe swung through the void,
And Time shook, something was smashed to pieces around them, and everything stopped. The images vanished, leaving the two presences alone in the darkness.
The Gatekeeper gave a scream of anguish. "I should have realized!" its cry was angry and tired, tearful and fiery at the same time. "Time…I destroyed it!"
Windfire wondered, through the thick haze of his emotions, if he could walk. He took a step forward and found that he could. He walked, then ran to the great monster, which shook with tears.
"No," he replied, the Gatekeeper's shape blurred by his tears. "It's my fault. I asked the favour of you; I was the one who made time stop." He had hoped so much that he could erase all the pain that he had caused. Now, he had ended Time, and here, they floated in anti-time, the world no longer existent. More tears flowed, but they were useless. What use was there?
"I—I loved him too much." The Gatekeeper was crying now, crying with him. This was not the voice of the cold, merciless monster he knew. It was the voice of the girl he had seen in the memory, the voice of another who had loved, and suffered because of love.
"At least…at least, we're not alone here."
He thought of Oceanlight's face once more, imagined her smiling, laughing and watching the sunset by the river with him, something that was further than infinity now, something that he could never forget.
I love you, Oceanlight. I love you, and I never should have done this.
I'm sorry.
Then the emotions seemed to fill the air, not his alone, but the Gatekeeper's as well. Its shape flickered between it and her, and its eyes were cast down in memory of her love. They were apart, yet one. And both, they did all they could do now—they remembered, with all the pain, all the passion and all the suffering, what could be, what could have been, but would never be anymore.
It happened too suddenly. By a miracle, an impossible miracle that they thought would never come, the cogs and wheels of time clicked into place again, as if mended by their feelings, mended by love.
Love makes the world go round.
Wasn't that a famous saying he had not believed before? He believed it now, as the movement of Time smoothened slowly, and the old routine passage returned. Love, such a strange, powerful emotion that would never be understood, a power that philosophers and scientists alike had sought to understand and grasp, but had never managed to. Had it the power to start time again?
It was all so hard to understand. But so much was, he realized.
"Windfire," the Gatekeeper's voice came to him. "Are you sure this is the future you want? Are you sure you want to leave…her…?"
"I brought her pain," he replied. "I don't want her to be in pain. And I'm glad I did it."
He didn't need to hear it; he knew that she understood.
Close by, Windfire held up his bow and shot down a Lucida with ease. He never stopped watching the girl who now chatted with her friends as they admired the garden.
He smiled at her, and she smiled back. The brightness and plainness in her smile made his soul rejoice and his heart ache at the same time.
Oceanlight. He didn't know how he had met her, by coincidence or not, but here they were, in the same garden, on the same day.
He did miss her, miss her voice, her smiles of love, and her touch. But all the same, he was glad for the joy that now showed in her face, joy that she would never have felt if he had not made her forget him. It felt so strange, how this girl, who could have been his wife, was now as much as a stranger to him.
They departed soon, but the bittersweet emotions in the air lingered like perfume. He continued to train.
Windfire looked up at the sky and saw the sunset. It was glorious, the clouds all aflame with the light of the slanted rays, like pillars of gold, gilding Orbis. He recalled the day they had met and seen the sunset together. The winds that swept about his head could almost have been her arm about his shoulders.
And together with a stack of memories that still lay unforgotten in his mind, Windfire watched as the sun set, and the spangles of stars blinked into existence above him, like the ceiling of the Warped Passage, one small light at a time.