'The aftermath of one very long night.'
Chapter Twenty-Six: Picking Up the Pieces
Brain's hands tick-tick-ticked against the table, turning a shard of mythril over and over. He hadn't actually tried to do anything with it in heartbeats that felt like hours; picking it up had been busy work, mostly, his notebook open and scribbled full of notes that only half made sense, even just a few moments after he'd written them. His eyes hung heavy, mind fuzzy, but his heart was still jittering, a too-fast beat behind his ribcage.
Ambient sounds rolled over him, soothing, if only slightly. Kvasir's quiet snores, and Mimir's lighter breathing; the quiet creak of the bed; the faint rustling of clothes as the others shifted in their sleep. And there were other noises that made him jump—like the surprisingly loud shout of someone calling to a friend, out late from work. He cast a glance at his friends, bundled into a small pile, and then went back to his work, mythril twisting over the edges of his knuckles.
Someone sighed, long and low; a chair screeched quietly, and Meili settled into it, their shadow falling across his notebook. "What are you working on, kid?"
"We're going to need more protection, right? Pretty sure Aegir isn't just going to let this slide." And they'd need to face the people of Scala, too—if and when they decided to side with one of their bluebloods.
(Master's Defender hummed, steady and present; it hung like a weight in his chest, comforting but overwhelming, almost, filling an empty space over-full. Master's Defender belongs to the ruler of Scala ad Caelum, Frigga had said, and Brain didn't want to think about what it meant that he had it, now.)
Meili's fingers drummed against the table. "I heard something happened between him and Frigga tonight."
The mythril clattered against the table.
"I don't know the details," Meili continued, but Brain could feel them watching him. "I was out looking for you lot. But there were whispers around the Exploration Department, when I got back."
"Surprised you're not still out there looking," Brain said, if mostly to ignore how present Master's Defender suddenly felt.
"You can thank your friend for that."
Another weight. "Friend?"
"Guy with a mask. Came out to Sol to let us know you were all back safely."
Brain swallowed tightly, words scrawling off into empty lines. "I'll have to thank him for that."
Quiet, then, Brain's pen scratching against the paper, scribbling out half-fractured ideas. If we each had personal barrier spells, maybe. I should revisit the Spirits—see if I can get them to work, this time, to keep tabs on things. Or—
"What happened?"
("You will never do enough to make up for your failure.")
"You'll have to ask Skuld and Kvasir," Brain answered, tasting something bitter. "I wasn't there when they got Mimir out."
The chair creaked as Meili leaned back. Brain caught them folding their arms out of the corner of his eye. The silence lengthened, like they expected him to say something into it. "Why's that?" they prompted finally.
(You're always leaving them behind, aren't you?)
"Error in judgment."
Meili sighed. "Kid—"
"They weren't with Aegir," Brain interrupted. "Darkness took them."
Meili went quiet.
"Aegir said they claimed that Mimir 'belonged' to them. Not sure how reliable his word is. Probably easier to just wait until they're awake to talk about things."
Another sigh, exhausted and world-weary. "Why do you kids have to be so stubborn?"
Brain shrugged, setting the mythril down to pick up another fragment, turning it over and pretending to study it.
"Well," Meili said, quiet, "while the four of you were off scaring the shit out of me, I did some digging of my own." They stood, reaching for their bag—left abandoned by the door—and rummaged through it carefully. They pulled a shape out of it that was familiar, even from a distance, and Brain stared at them with a complicated tangle of emotions as they came back to the table and handed the Book of Prophecies to him. "Here."
He hesitated; even without touching it, the Book felt weighty, the responsibility heavier now that he knew what failure meant. He took it anyways, fingers gentle around the cover, and Master's Defender hummed. He'd given both away—and now, somewhat inexplicably, both had returned to him. But we might finally be able to figure out where the others went to. Where they're supposed to end up—where we can look.
"Where'd you find it?" Brain asked, words running ahead of his mind.
"Frigga's office. She's probably not going to be happy when she realizes it's gone. She'll probably know it was me, but she didn't seem to know that I was helping you guys yet, so you might be alright." They grimaced. "That's another thing we're going to have to talk about once everyone's awake."
Brain's throat tightened. He rubbed a thumb gently along the cover, like he was brushing away dirt. After a moment he tucked it away, sticking it carefully in his coat. "Thanks. I'll—let Skuld know. Later."
Meili had a complicated expression on their face, but they nodded, anyways, letting him return to his work—or, at least, to pretend that he was doing something.
(It'll never be enough. You can never do enough to prove that you deserve to be here—to make up for the people you left behind. Their lives are lost, and that can't be undone.)
His pen fell from his fingers. He blinked, vision blurry, and scrubbed his eyes.
"Go to sleep, kid."
"I'm fine."
"Sure. You've only spent the last few days looking for a missing friend—but you're fine."
Brain opened his mouth, ready to argue—but paused when he heard shifting behind him. He turned in time to see Skuld move, slipping out the window without a single glance their way.
Meili stared after her, grimacing. "I guess there's another one who couldn't sleep."
"I'll talk to her," Brain said, as much to give himself something else to do as it was of genuine worry.
Meili eyed him, then sighed. "Yeah, alright. I guess she's probably more likely to talk to you than me."
Brain pushed away from the table, almost relieved to have a justifiable excuse to leave the work behind, and made his way towards the window.
Skuld had crawled a little way from the window, sitting with her knees pulled up to her chest, balanced carefully on the slanted rooftop. Her head was lowered, expression so shadowed he couldn't see it.
Brain cleared his throat and lightly rapped his knuckles against the window frame.
Skuld shifted a little, but didn't turn to look at him. "Hey."
"Hey. You mind if I join you?"
Skuld shook her head, and carefully Brain worked his way out of the window, settling on the roof beside her. Scala was dark below them, few people wandering under the flickering lamplights, and it made Brain think uncomfortably of the ruins, far beneath their feet.
Skuld twisted something between her fingertips—his charm, he realized, her fingers running over the glass, a far-off expression on her face. "Do you ever wonder," she whispered, "what it would be like if we hadn't ended up here?"
He thought of Daybreak Town, and of the friends they'd left behind. "All the time."
"Not just—not just if things hadn't fallen apart. In the aftermath—what if we had ended up somewhere else? Alone, or with different people, or—I don't know."
He searched her expression, so carefully closed, and found himself hesitating. "I've thought of leaving," he said finally. "Of what it'd be like to go somewhere else." He swallowed, tight. "Make it easier to look for the others."
"And not have to think about—about what else is here."
He blinked, and he saw the ruins of the Clock Tower. "Yeah. That, too." A hesitant moment; he almost didn't say anything, the words sticky in his throat, but he glanced back at his friend, and he found himself admitting, whisper-quiet, "Before you came here…I thought I was going to be alone." He thought he saw her shoulders hitch, and he tried to ignore it. "It wasn't something I wanted to dwell on, so I didn't, most of the time. But you can't outrun your thoughts forever, I guess." He made half an attempt at a crooked smile, nudging her lightly. "Thinking too much, right?"
Skuld didn't quite smile, something in her expression still too weighed-down.
"But—yeah. I've thought about it before. Of staying in Daybreak Town instead of Ephemer, or of what it'd be like not to have any of you here." He turned to look at her, waiting expectantly.
Skuld curled in on herself a little; he realized how tired she looked then, the bags under her eyes and the slump of her shoulders. He wondered if she'd actually been asleep, or if she'd just been faking it to avoid talking to any of them. "Darkness gave you some sort of vision, right?" Before he could answer, she continued, "Mine was of—of what could have been. Of what should have been, I think."
It clicked after a moment. "Where you were supposed to end up."
Skuld nodded.
Brain's breath hissed between his teeth. Fear sank its teeth into his bones, and he shoved it away stubbornly. "You're here now. That's what matters."
"But I wasn't supposed to be. What if me being here messed everything up? What if it's the reason—" She broke off, breathing choked, and pressed her forehead against her knees.
"The reason?" he prompted gently.
Skuld didn't answer for several long, long moments. When she did, it was quiet and shaky, closer to a sob than a word: "Mimir."
Brain's eyebrows furrowed. "Mimir—was Aegir's fault." He wouldn't have known if Kvasir hadn't told him, something inside him whispered, and he shoved that away, too, because they'd gotten Mimir back, and Brain was reasonably certain Kvasir had realized the seriousness of his mistake. "Don't go blaming yourself for someone else's actions."
Skuld was shaking her head almost before he finished. "That's not—it's different." She turned to him, eyes wet, something broken in her expression. "It's them. My friend—mine and Ephemer's."
Brain blinked, and it took a moment for it to really sink in what she was implying. "Mimir?"
She nodded, and Brain might've questioned it if she didn't look so hopelessly heartbroken. She believed it, at the very least. "They knew things they shouldn't—things about us. I don't know all of the details, but it's—it's them."
He wanted to be skeptical—but stranger things had happened, and the look on Skuld's face made him pause. "Okay," he said, trying to compartmentalize. "Okay." He turned back towards Scala, mind working over the idea slowly. "How would that work? We don't really know where hearts go after death; could be a reincarnation thing, and maybe they just tapped into old memories. But—"
(But don't you know? something whispered, and for a moment he felt the low, comforting hum of an all-encompassing heart calling him home.)
"Brain, I don't really—" Skuld broke off, exhaling a frustrated breath.
He flashed her an apologetic look. "Right. Sorry."
They sat there in relative silence for a few moments, the quiet sounds of nightfall echoing around them. After a beat Skuld slumped against his shoulder; he wobbled a little, trying to balance himself, but Skuld hardly seemed to notice, eyes half-focused on the starlight reflected in her charm. "I don't know what to do," she whispered. "I keep thinking that maybe—maybe I called them here. Or that maybe if I hadn't been here, Mimir wouldn't have remembered, and they could just be…happy."
"Happy…alone," Brain answered skeptically.
"You didn't see them. They were—they wanted to stay there. With Darkness. They wanted to stay, because remembering hurt too much." She went very, very quiet. "Being around me hurt too much."
Brain stared at her, and after a moment his breath hissed quietly between his teeth. "Alright. I can't say for sure what would've happened if you weren't here, but I can hazard a guess. You were the first person Mimir really became friends with; you introduced them to both Kvasir and me. If you weren't here, neither of us would've had any reason to interact with them—or with each other. So all of us probably would've stayed alone. Kvasir may or may not have figured out what his family was up to without a catalyst. Mimir might've made new friends—but they weren't exactly doing well on their own. And I—"
He thought of nights spent lonely in the Clock Tower. He thought of an empty apartment, and the aimless, drifting feeling of finding yourself somewhere foreign, with no one that you knew. He thought of his frustrations with the council, and of Sigurd's spying, and he wondered, for a moment, where he would've ended up, in a different world.
It might've worked out okay, in the end. He'd never know for sure. But— "I'm happy you're here," he whispered, and tried to ignore the part of him that said that was selfish.
Skuld blinked rapidly, eyes wet. She didn't say anything, just pressed against his shoulder, lowering her head towards her knees. Brain was content to let the silence persist, exhaustion tugging on an ache in his chest. If there's anyone who shouldn't be here, it's me, not you, he didn't say—but he came close, the words knocking against the back of his teeth.
"Master's Defender?" Skuld asked finally, quiet.
Ah. They were going back to that, then. The Keyblade still hummed content in his chest; the hum rose to a song as he lifted his hand, Master's Defender flashing into his open palm. Whispers he couldn't quite catch flickered through his ears; something like a weight settled on his shoulders, like countless hands resting on them, wrapping around him, supporting his arms. It was gone almost in an instant, but the warmth was still there, thrumming warm through his chest.
One finger ran along the handle. The Keyblade was worn with age, now, and up close, he could see the scratches and dents, the rust so carefully scrubbed away, the dulled colors and almost rusty tone to its song. It was like staring at a friend that had grown up without him, and his fingers tightened around the handle. Carefully he lowered it to his lap; looking at it made his throat feel like it was closing, but it was hard to tear his eyes away.
Skuld was giving the weapon a curious look. She knows you don't deserve it, something in him hissed, and he pushed it away roughly; her expression was open, not judgmental, no matter what his anxious mind tried to tell him.
But she was still waiting for an explanation.
"I called for it. It—came."
"Brain," Skuld said, exasperated, and despite himself he flinched—barely noticeable, if you didn't know him. But then, Skuld did. "Brain?" she repeated, worried this time, and he exhaled heavily through his nose because damn it, he was actually going to have to explain, wasn't he?
"It—" The word got caught on a shaky exhale. The keychain rattled, and Brain braced his free hand against the weapon, trying to steady it. "I—went to get Sigurd." Skuld's eyebrows furrowed, and he almost, almost didn't clarify, but forced himself to continue, the words sticky in his throat, "When we were fighting Darkness."
He braced himself, half-expecting a rebuke—some sort of angry realization, that this was the reason he wasn't there to help with Mimir, because he should have been the box wasn't even there—but there was nothing. Just the same quiet, expectant confusion, Skuld's tears slowing and head tilting, like she was trying to figure out some sort of puzzle.
A strange part of him wanted to clarify—to push, to point out what she'd missed, because she should be mad—but there was a bigger part of him that was afraid, and a bigger part still that didn't want to talk about this at all, so he bit down on the words and looked away. "Darkness was upset. We needed to get out." He shrugged, hands tightening around the weapon.
"And that's…it?"
He thought of Ephemer, insisting that he was worthy of the weapon, and the words sank so deep he couldn't reach them anymore.
"You never seemed like you wanted to wield Master's Defender, before."
A half a shrug. "Couldn't get out otherwise." Before she could protest, he added, "It's not the only thing I got back tonight."
Skuld frowned, looking discontent with his explanation, until he pulled the Book of Prophecies out his jacket. Her expression went slack; one hand lifted, like she wanted to snatch it out of his hands, but hesitated. "How did you…?"
"Not me. Meili." This, at least, was easier. "I guess they stole it from Frigga while we were gone."
Skuld's expression softened slowly, turning almost bittersweet. "I guess we can finally find out," she murmured. "About the others. And—" And me. She didn't say the words, but Brain heard them, all the same.
Master's Defender disappeared with a flash. His hand rested, carefully, against the cover of the Book. "So. Are we…?"
Just on the edge of his hearing, Brain thought he caught the sounds of people stirring, back inside Meili's apartment. He blinked, and when he lifted his head he realized the horizon was, slowly, tinging with gray.
Day was coming, then. They wouldn't have a lot of time to look, if they wanted to do so privately.
Skuld bit her lip. She glanced towards the window, something almost frightened in her expression.
"You alright?"
"I—" Skuld broke off, then took a shuddering breath and looked back at him. "If Mimir's awake—I think I need to talk to them."
Ah. "Later, then."
She gave him a grateful smile. "Can we…meet up, somewhere?"
Brain considered it a moment. There weren't a lot of places that were secure; the café was too open, and anywhere in the Clock Tower would risk Frigga—or someone who reported to Frigga—finding them. Meili's would be safe, but…he wasn't sure he was anxious to share this bit of his past (his future?) with them just yet. Not when he didn't know what he'd find.
…He wondered if Skuld felt the same.
"The apartment," Brain said, finally. "The old one." Nobody else was using it—or at least, he didn't think so. Aegir might know about it, but it was probably the safest option they had.
Skuld's eyes flickered with surprise, but she nodded. And then she hugged him, knocking him slightly off-balance. "Thank you, Brain."
After a hesitant moment, he hugged her back. "What are friends for?"
-When Skuld crawled back into the apartment, she got a disapproving look from Meili. "You know," they said dryly, "you two can stop trying to give me heart attacks. I think I've been more stressed over the past couple of days than I have in my entire life."
"You're getting old, love," Bridget said, grinning.
"Not that old. And what does that make you two?"
"Younger than you," Eric answered, smiling as he threw an arm around Meili's shoulder.
"By a year."
Skuld laughed quietly, and she caught Brain's snort as he slipped aside, letting her set her feet firmly on the floor. She didn't see Mimir or Kvasir at first, and something caught in her chest, eyes frantically scanning for—
There. The two of them were in the kitchen; Kvasir was at the stove, working on something and chattering amicably, though the worry in his expression said it was more a distraction than anything. Mimir had pulled a chair up near him; they still looked drained, leaning against the countertop and eyes heavy, but they looked like they were trying to smile.
Skuld's throat tightened as she stared at them. Is it really you? After all this time…?
(For a moment, she was standing in that broken Daybreak Town again, staring at a friend who wore two faces, trying to sort through feelings she couldn't quite figure out.)
Kvasir noticed them finally and brightened, waving frantically. "Hello! Good morning!"
"Are you supposed to be in the kitchen unsupervised?" Brain asked dryly.
Eric made a noise of alarm and untangled himself from Meili, hurrying over to help.
Meili just sighed and shook their head.
"I'll have you know," Kvasir said, sounding proud, "that I'm making breakfast."
"…Right. I'll stick to coffee."
Kvasir made a vaguely wounded noise. "You're not even going to try it?"
"I knew your ancestor. I think the lack of cooking skills is hereditary."
"I'm not—"
"Kvasir," Eric interjected, "the food is burning."
He yelped and turned around, and Skuld smothered a laugh as she watched the two of them try to salvage breakfast.
Meili shook their head and sighed. "Alright. I'm just going to get something on the way to work."
"Meili!" came twin protests, and that drew a real laugh out of Skuld—quiet, but still there.
Just barely, she caught a quieter huff of laughter—Mimir, face crinkled with amusement, still watching the two of them flounder. She met their eyes, and for a moment things felt achingly familiar—like the two of them were back in Daybreak Town, and everything was normal.
Mimir's expression dropped after a moment; the amusement wasn't gone, entirely, but there was something very, very tired in their expression, and it forced Skuld to remember where and when she was all over again. It ached, tugging at old wounds; she wondered how Mimir was handling it, when they hadn't even known those wounds were there to begin with. "Can we…talk?" she asked, quiet. She didn't think Eric or Kvasir heard her—Bridget, either, egging on their protests—but Meili and Brain did, Meili giving her an appraising look and Brain's expression softening with understanding.
Mimir cast her a side-eyed look—a thing that said they knew they should, but weren't sure if they wanted to yet.
Skuld's fingers flexed, and she felt strangely adrift, standing in the middle of Meili's kitchen. "Are you…ready to…?" she asked, haltingly, even as she silently, desperately begged them to say yes.
Mimir's expression twisted with something complicated. Their hands lifted halfway, then paused. Their shoulders slumped with a slow exhale, and then they pushed themself into a standing position, the chair making a quiet screech.
Most of the kitchen might not have heard Skuld, but they did seem to notice Mimir, because suddenly everything went very, very quiet. Mimir hunched in on themself, and Skuld clenched her fists and tried to swallow her guilt.
"Ah, Mimir!" Kvasir's eyes flicked between them, an awkward smile on his face. "Is everything alright?"
It was directed at her, too, she realized after a moment, and she wasn't entirely sure how she should feel about that.
Mimir's lips pressed flat. They turned pointedly away from everyone, grabbing Skuld's arm and tugging her towards the door.
"O…kay?"
"We'll be back!" Skuld managed to shout through her surprise, stumbling through the door and ignoring the stares on her back. The door closed, and she found herself easing just a little, without feeling like everyone was watching them.
Mimir released her arm and kept walking, scurrying down the stairs to the streets. They flinched a little when they stepped into the early morning light, footsteps faltering near the edges of the cobblestones. With a shaky breath they turned, heading down a darker alleyway, and Skuld hurried to follow. Her skin prickled, and she suddenly wished that they'd just dealt with the stares, or gone out onto the roof like she had with Brain, or something, if it meant they didn't have to wander the streets where—
(Darkness could be here or Aegir could send someone after them or—)
"Where are we going?" Skuld asked, taking a breath and forcing her thoughts to focus on her friend.
Mimir didn't answer, and so Skuld followed them silently, trailing in their footsteps. She thought, almost, that they were unbothered by being out in the streets again—but then they jumped, spooked, at the sound of someone talking nearby, and Skuld had to clench her fists to keep from summoning her Keyblade. I should've waited, she thought, but it felt too late to turn back now.
Through back alleys, edging along the streets, winding their way past the training grounds—it wasn't until Mimir led them to a small garden, tucked away from everything else, that she realized she knew where they were. This is where we came when I wanted to know about the bluebloods. When we started to become friends.
(But you were friends before this, weren't you?)
Skuld's throat tightened, and Mimir turned to look at her. In the gray hours before morning, they still looked hazy, and it made it easier for Skuld to see a different place.
They were waiting for her, she realized. It made sense; she was the one who wanted to initiate the conversation. But now that they were here, she wasn't entirely sure what to say.
"You—" Skuld broke off, breath stuttering. After a hesitant moment she reached out, one hand carefully cupping Mimir's cheek. They flinched a little, and she flinched back, jerking her hand away quickly. "I'm sorry. I just—" She stared at them helplessly. They looked like Mimir; out here, away from Darkness, nothing about them had changed. But she couldn't just forget everything that had happened, down in the ruins. "How…?"
Their expression fell slowly, turning into something sad. Their hand moved, and she didn't understand what they were doing until they'd grabbed hers gently, thumb running over her palm. They released a shaky breath, hand squeezing hers a little—and then they let her go, blinking rapidly.
"Mimir?" she asked, a different name nearly spilling off of her tongue.
"Skuld," they said, and for a moment she thought she heard them. Something must've shown on her expression, because Mimir's broke, and they turned away just as quickly.
"Wait—I'm sorry. I didn't mean to—if you're not ready to talk about it, we don't have to."
Mimir paused, shoulders curled around their ears, arms crossed like they were hugging themself.
Skuld swallowed, because she wanted to say so much more, but she didn't even know where to begin. "I missed you," she said instead, almost without thinking about it, and winced, stung with sudden guilt, because before it'd been Mimir and that didn't feel fair—
"I missed you, too," they whispered, quiet, and Skuld snapped towards them, surprised. "I was searching for you my whole life, and all this time you were—" They broke off, head lowered, eyes squeezing shut.
She hesitated for half a moment before she tried their name, tentative and uncertain, her chest aching with sudden grief. She wasn't sure what it was for, anymore.
Something in Mimir's expression pinched, and she clamped down on anything else, swallowing the words. They released their arms finally; their shaking hands made it difficult to figure out the words, but—
"I'm not entirely them."
Skuld's eyes flicked from their hands to their face and back again, biting back her questions and staring.
"After they—I died, Chirithy," they fumbled a bit, expression creasing, "told me I could go to sleep, or—or I could let my heart melt into another one. I didn't know what that meant. But." They paused, their hands shaking, and stared at them, like their words had fallen between their fingertips.
Skuld started to stretch a hand towards them, then stopped, pulling it back. She wasn't sure what she should do for them. If it was her old friend, she might've dragged them off to do something, taking their mind off things and just letting them be, until they were ready to use their rare words to explain. She very nearly did, the familiarity creeping into her bones until it ached.
But they're Mimir, too.
And Mimir—Mimir might not say much aloud, but they seemed happy to have someone they could sign too, and—and if she interrupted them, would she make things worse? So in the end she did nothing, hands clenched close as she watched and waited.
"I think I—they were supposed to be asleep. That we weren't supposed to be so…mixed together." Mimir blinked, and for a moment they looked at their hands like they were something foreign. "But I—they—something went wrong. Their heart was…stronger, than the newborn heart they found." They paused, for a moment, guilt curling their expression. "I didn't mean to."
Skuld swallowed, and she wasn't sure what she felt about that—if she was angry or relieved or just confused. "So you—" She broke off, searching for the words she wanted to say. "You've always been…?"
Mimir turned to her finally, expression sad, and she got the impression that they knew what she was trying to say, anyways. "I had memories of you," they signed, "and the other Union Leaders. You were…the people I was looking for." They stopped, expression turning far-off. "But there was a lot I didn't know. I lived a whole different life, and now—" They broke off, breath shuddering, and Skuld's resolve broke. She dragged them into a hug, and they sank into it without complaint, even if they didn't return it.
"I'm sorry," Skuld whispered, because she didn't know what else she was supposed to say.
Mimir leaned further into the hug, until it felt like Skuld was mostly supporting them. The two of them sank to the ground, and Skuld realized she was shaking, tears stinging the corners of her eyes. "I'm sorry," she repeated, and she didn't know if she was just sorry they had to go through this, or if she was apologizing—for what happened centuries ago, for fighting them.
(For the part of her that was happy that she still had her friend, even if it meant the small heart of who they would have been was lost years ago. For the part that was relieved, that they hadn't replaced the Mimir she'd known entirely.
She wondered what would've happened, if they hadn't overwhelmed that small heart. Would she have only seen flickers of the person she knew once? Would they have fallen further into sleep, until there was nothing left of them at all?)
"I—" She pulled away, a little, because she had so much she wanted to say. I missed you. I want to start over. You tricked us. I watched you die. It felt like a chance to get closure, after everything that had happened at the end of the world; it felt like relief, to have another piece of her past with her.
It felt like guilt, to even consider saying any of that when Mimir still looked so lost.
(She stared at them, and she saw them at the Founder's Fountain, that night after their ill-fated first mission. She saw them coming to the Exploration Department for the first time. She saw them laughing with Kvasir. Did getting one friend back mean losing another?)
Her eyes stung, her throat closing in confused grief. Maybe this was a bad idea, after all, because she had no idea what she was supposed to do.
Neither did they, she realized, from the look on their face. They looked a little scared; she wondered if they were scared of her, and that's why they looked so hesitant to speak to her, before.
"You're my friend," she said, setting aside her complicated feelings for the moment, because regardless of anything else, that was still true. She clasped their hands, gripping them tightly, because she needed to make sure they understood this. "No matter what. Whether you're more Mimir or—or them, or something in between." It felt like it was tearing open a fresh wound, and she didn't bother trying to stop the tears because she didn't think she could.
Mimir's expression crumpled. They hitched a breath, and then they were hugging her again, fingers curling into her jacket. "I'm scared," they whispered. "I—"
She hugged them back tightly. "Me, too," she admitted, quiet.
"I feel like—" They broke off, breath shuddering, and pulled away, signing with clumsy hands. "I feel like there's too much in my head." They paused, expression lost, and Skuld waited, trying not to disturb them.
When they finally started signing again, they surprised her: "Can you tell me about them?"
"I—" The words felt sticky, caught against her ribs. She wanted to ask, You don't know? but they were staring at her with a lost expression, and it was hard to deny the request. "They were…quiet. Like you. They're the one I learned sign from—but they didn't use it, much. They used their expressions and body language a lot more."
"So the sign is mostly me. Mimir."
Her throat tightened, but she nodded.
They looked relieved for a moment, but then twisted into something complicated.
If Skuld looked too long, she thought she could see echoes of them, and that ached enough that she had to turn away. "They cared a lot about people. They—they stayed behind to fight in the Keyblade War because they didn't like the idea of leaving anyone behind. Brave, too. I remember when we first met, they challenged a Foreteller to avenge Ephemer."
"He was okay."
"I know—but we didn't then." It was a bittersweet memory, and her smile softened a little as she thought about it. "They were my second close friend. I got along with my old party members, but Ephemer was kind of the glue that held us together. But with them—I don't know. We bonded over both knowing Ephemer, first—they'd barely had a chance to befriend him, and they wanted to know more about what he'd really been like. And then we realized we had more things in common, and it just—" She broke off, sucking in an unsteady breath.
Mimir waited, quiet.
"I thought I lost you once," she whispered, the words tasting bitter. "We got you out of the Keyblade War, and it seemed like we saved you, and then the end of the world came and—" She broke into a helpless laugh, bitter and grieved. "I watched you die. I watched you die, and now—"
And now we might have a second chance—but what's the cost of that?
She stared at Mimir's twisted expression, and her words fell away, mouth working soundlessly. "And I'm sorry," she said finally. "You don't—you don't need—"
"It's okay. I asked." Mimir's hands shook. "They…hated fighting you. They just didn't know what else they were supposed to do."
"I—I know." She knew, but that didn't mean that she wasn't still angry—that she didn't still have nightmares about them attacking her. "I just wish it hadn't happened."
Mimir rested their hands in their lap. She couldn't see their expression; she wondered what they were thinking, and she suddenly regretted saying anything at all. "But," she said, scrambling for something that might put their mind at ease, "maybe this is—is a good thing. Maybe it means we get a second chance."
"Even if it costs Mimir?"
She flinched. "That's not—"
"It might be what happens. You can't—I don't think we can have both."
There was that grief again, sharp and stinging, and a part of her wanted to scream because it didn't feel fair. She bit down the urge, breathing it out in a slow, frustrated breath instead.
Mimir must've noticed, because their expression softened a little. "What do we do?" they whispered, and it reminded her, achingly, of what it'd been like when she'd first arrived in Scala ad Caelum, the remains of the world she'd known crumbling around her.
She took their hand, squeezing it with both of hers, and she tried to push aside her complicated feelings for a moment, and remember what it was like, trying to navigate a hopelessly overwhelming situation, where it felt like she'd lost everything she'd ever known. "We keep going," she said, and she thought of an empty apartment, and a tiny lamp she'd brought back to Meili's, and of the new friends she'd slowly started to make. "And we make it our own."
Mimir offered her a tremulous smile, and it made her hope that, somehow, maybe things would turn out okay.
-There was an unease in Scala's streets that Sigurd couldn't quite ignore. Things were unusually quiet; people kept mostly to themselves, hunched over and silent, if they were out on the streets at all. Someone gave him a wary smile, but their eyes were pinched, and they hurried on before he even got the chance to ask why.
Another thing to add to his list of troubled thoughts, then.
His footsteps carried him towards the Clock Tower—to the very edge of the plaza with the Founder's Fountain, and there he stopped, frozen, and stared at the destruction.
The fountain itself was still intact—Light, he could imagine the uproar if something had happened to that—but parts of the streets had been torn apart. Ash was scattered across the buildings; water filled indents in the cobblestones deep enough to sink into. A couple of people were there, working to clear the streets, carefully fencing off the area—not that it seemed to matter, since no one seemed to be getting very close. In the center of it was Bryn, her expression flat as she discussed something with one of her workers.
"What happened here?" The words slipped out before Sigurd could register that he'd said them, but Bryn heard him, anyways, snapping in his direction. His shoulders lifted, hands starting to come up defensively, but something in him rallied, and he went as close to the barrier as he dared, feet just touching the edge of the cracked cobblestones. "Were there Heartless here?" Was it us? some part of him asked, but didn't dare speak aloud. Is this the effects of fighting Darkness?
…Did we make a mistake?
Bryn's expression creased with confusion. "You didn't hear?"
"I—no. I was…working late last night."
It didn't seem to ease her confusion, but she let it go, turning back to the destruction. "Master Aegir challenged Master Frigga for the leadership of Scala ad Caelum."
Aegir. The one who had taken the Union Leaders' friend. "But I heard that hasn't been done since—"
"I know." Bryn blinked slowly, turning back towards him. "Master Frigga won, but it was a near thing. Master's Defender disappeared toward the end, and no one's entirely sure why."
It felt like the air had been driven out of him.
(Brain had Master's Defender. He didn't know how or why, and Brain wouldn't explain, but he had it, and that was supposed to be the leader's Keyblade, how did—)
(What had they done?)
"I…see," Sigurd managed finally.
Bryn gave him a curious look, but shook her head, like she was dismissing the issue. "That's the gist of it. You'll need to speak with Master Frigga if you want to learn more—you work for her, right?"
Numbly, he nodded.
"I imagine she'll be out to speak to everyone at some point." She frowned, glancing back towards the Clock Tower, like she expected her to be here now. Sigurd wondered why she wasn't, after such a major fight—but then, it was still early in the morning. Perhaps she just wanted to give everyone time to wake up.
Sigurd dipped his head, offering Bryn a quick murmur of thanks, and headed in the direction of the Clock Tower. Perhaps I shouldn't have gone with them, he thought. For a moment, he thought he could see a creature winding around a mirror, and he shuddered.
(What do you want to do, Sigurd?)
It felt like he was tiptoeing through the streets, suddenly, keeping carefully off to the side, trying just as hard to keep himself from being noticed as everyone else. It was a little early, for him to be heading towards the Clock Tower—without his job as Brain's "guide," so to speak, he felt like he had very little to do, besides run errands. Still, it was better for his uneasy mind to have something to do—and better, at least, than wandering the streets of Scala like a ghost, much like his former ward had done, when he'd first gotten here.
(He had thought of nothing, and everything. Of Darkness, and the children who had gone to face it. Of himself, who always seemed to find himself reporting to someone and never doing anything. Of the visions they saw, and the tangled emotions at the fact that he felt like he could barely remember his at all. Of the fact that he couldn't talk to anyone about this, and how suddenly alone that made him feel.)
He didn't mean to make his way to the gardens. Perhaps, his mind still on Frigga and Aegir, his feet had simply taken him to one of her preferred places. Or, perhaps, he'd wanted somewhere more peaceful—somewhere he could sit and work through his scattered thoughts. But regardless, he stepped onto the grass, and paused for a moment when he found himself staring at the back of a familiar figure.
Frigga was sitting on one of the benches. She was…quiet. Her head was lifted, like she was watching something, and Sigurd hesitated half a moment, hating to intrude. But then she tilted her head just a little, breathing out a quiet sigh. "Do you need to speak to me, Sigurd?"
"I—n-no. No, I just—didn't know you were here." He fidgeted, feet twisting in the grass.
The silence stretched, long. Sigurd…thought he should leave, probably. He didn't need to be here. He could easily go back to the Clock Tower, and find something else to keep him busy. But he couldn't make himself leave, mind chasing questions in frantic circles.
"I suppose you heard about the fight last night."
Sigurd started, and before he'd thought about it he was tripping over himself to reply, "W-well, it's—I heard that it turned out alright, but—you haven't made any sort of statement, and that normally seems like something you'd be on top of, and—" And he broke off, swamped by sudden shame, and a brief, flickering spark of anger.
"You can't rush things," Frigga said into the silence. "You have to—think through what to say carefully. Speak too early, and you'll make people believe that you are…bothered by what occurred."
"Are you bothered?"
Frigga tilted her head a little—not enough for him to see her face, but enough that he knew she was listening carefully. "That's unusually brazen of you."
Not with everyone, he thought, his mind flickering, briefly, to Brain. And then a quieter part of him whispered, almost annoyed, Why shouldn't I be? This fight could affect Scala ad Caelum as a whole.
Frigga made a low humming sound, and it took Sigurd a moment to realize he'd said that out loud. "I'm—sorry. That was out of line. But—" Another pause, and then he found himself rushing forward, desperate to say something before he lost the words again: "I heard you lost Master's Defender."
Frigga shifted, just a little, but she held herself very carefully, every movement almost unnervingly calculated. "It was a long fight. I lost my grip, and it disappeared. That's all."
Could you summon it now? he thought, but managed not to say. It came with others, like, The last time I saw the Keyblade, Master Brain had it, and, What does it mean for us, if you lost your Keyblade? and, Are you doing alright? and, You're the leader of Scala ad Caelum, you need to do something.
"Master Frigga—"
"Sigurd," Frigga interrupted, her voice surprisingly brittle, "I have been running this city far longer than you have worked for me. Unless you have something you need me for, I would suggest you focus on your own duties."
That came with different protests—You haven't given me anything else to do, and, Why do you always dismiss my ideas out of hand?—but he bit them down, watching the way Frigga turned from him carefully, still so stiff. "…Very well, Master Frigga." He dipped into a bow she couldn't see, then backed away, dipping into the shadow of a building.
Only when she seemed to think he was gone did she relax, her shoulders falling, head bowing low with a quiet, exhausted sigh.
His shoulder collided with something—or someone, he guessed, by the way they stumbled, and he cursed himself quietly. "I'm sorry, I should've been watching—"
There was no one there.
Sigurd stared, and he had one, panicked moment where he thought that maybe helping the Union Leaders had attracted unwanted attention, or that someone had come to fight Frigga when she couldn't fight back, before a familiar voice whispered, "Easy, Sigurd. It's just me."
"Master Brain?" He dropped his voice, glancing incredulously between him, Frigga, and back. Frigga, at least, didn't seem to be paying attention to them anymore. "What are you doing here?"
"Probably the same as you. Needed to think."
"And you needed to be invisible to do that?"
"Didn't want to be seen." A pause, and then very quietly, he added, "I wondered if Frigga would be here. After last night."
Oh. "You heard?"
"Saw some things, as I was coming here. But that's not what I meant."
Master's Defender, then. "You were worried."
A long pause—so long, in fact, that Sigurd half thought that Brain had decided to just abandon the conversation. But then: "Not worried, exactly. But—" He broke off, and this time the silence felt like something that he wasn't going to fill. It was starting to become a frustratingly familiar thing, these guessing games, and there was a flicker of old annoyance at it. It faded after a moment, because Sigurd, almost against his wishes, had come to get a much better understanding of the why of it.
(Your legends are children who deserved better than they got. That's what that hooded figure had told them, when they made their deal. He hadn't thought much of it then; he had been a child, and the figures of legend had always seemed so much greater than he did. The gap between him and them had seemed almost insurmountable.
But now he found himself faced with two of them—so much younger than he'd expected, displaced from their world and time and struggling to cope with politics and Darkness and assassins when they should just be children—and he was suddenly coming to understand what exactly that black-coated figure had meant.)
"I'll…leave you to think, I suppose." He wasn't under any sort of impression that he was wanted here—not by Frigga, and not by Brain—and he made to slip away, trying to ignore the bitter taste on his tongue.
"…Thank you. For yesterday."
Sigurd paused, for just a moment.
He still couldn't see Brain, but he could imagine him, almost—head tilted away, hat low enough to hide his eyes, but stubborn enough to see his words through. "It probably would've been harder, if you weren't there."
"I didn't do much."
To his surprise, Brain laughed. "Well, I'm not sure I did much, either. But you saved me from Darkness, so. Suppose that counts as something."
(This is still just a child.)
"I was just…returning the favor."
He heard Brain's snort, but this time, he didn't say anything to try and fill the silence, and so Sigurd slipped away, finally making his way towards the Clock Tower.
-Mimir stared at the book in their lap. They hadn't opened it yet; they'd probably been staring at it for close to an hour, ever since they'd gotten back to Meili's. It was a book of fairytales, picked up on half a whim; now they wondered if they (you) would show up in any of the tales. They wondered what sort of story you left behind—if you had done anything more than scatter scars across your friends' hearts.
Someone sighed tiredly—Meili, they realized after a moment, coming to settle across from them. It was just the two of you, for now—Bridget and Eric had gone off to get groceries, which felt surprisingly mundane, given everything that'd happened, and Kvasir had tagged along with them, casting Mimir a look like he understood they still needed space. Meili had stubbornly refused to leave, casting them side-eyed looks every now and again. Mimir lifted their head finally to meet their eyes, an ache still settled deep in their chest.
(Their mind swam with memories that somehow felt both foreign and familiar. They looked at Meili, and a part of them felt much, much older—like their peer or senior, not their student. It made Mimir's head ache. They wanted to curl up and go to sleep, and not have to deal with it anymore—but then, that's part of what had gotten them in this mess in the first place.)
"I'm not going to press you about what happened," Meili said, voice surprisingly quiet. "I've just got one question for you—and I need you to be honest with me, alright?"
It took a minute for you to realize they were waiting for your reply, and you nodded, quick and jerky.
"Are you okay?"
It shouldn't have taken them off guard, but it did. Their hands started shaking; their vision blurred; they tried to take a breath and hiccupped a sob, and then they tried to stifle it because they didn't mean to and they'd been crying enough lately and—
(And they could remember dying, now, pain burning through your chest, white-hot where your friend had struck you. All but two of the people you were searching for were gone; of the ones left, one barely knew you, and your relationship with the other had been tangled, between everything that had happened at the end and her friendship with—with them, with Mimir. They could remember the Keyblade War, but it still rang with the echoes of a fairytale, and they couldn't entirely wrap their head around the fact that they were there.)
"…No. Okay, then." Meili sighed, long and low. They rested a hand on Mimir's shoulder and, after a hesitant moment, pulled them into an awkward hug. Mimir returned it, clinging to them and trying to ignore the keening sob that had risen in their throat. "You ever want to talk about it," Meili whispered, "we're here to listen. In the meantime, let us know what you need. I'm not going to have a problem if you want to skip out of work for a while."
Mimir sniffed, then nodded against their shoulder. They released Meili, pulling away and scrubbing their nose.
Meili looked at them like they wanted to say more but weren't sure what. After a moment they sighed again, seeming to give up, and pulled a folded piece of paper out of their pocket. "Here. Found this on Sol."
Mimir's eyes furrowed, but they took the paper, anyways. They unfolded it, and they froze.
That's the contract Aegir wanted them to sign.
His signature stared back at them, and it felt like it burned. Their fingers crinkled the paper, and they were tempted to tear it apart.
"I figured it was better in your hands than anyone else's."
There was something dark and angry in Meili's eyes that Mimir didn't want to process, so they just nodded. Carefully they refolded the paper, sticking it into a pocket.
(Their hands were shaking.)
"I want," they whispered, "to sleep."
Meili's expression turned complicated, but they nodded anyways. "Alright. You can take the bed, if you want. Yell if you need me—I'm not going anywhere anytime soon."
It was comforting, despite everything, and Mimir flashed them a tentative smile before taking their offer and curling up on the bed.
(They dreamed of two lives, and a part of them whispered their names over and over and over again, like they were hoping not to forget them.)
Skuld and Mimir's conversation went through a couple of different versions—mostly because I was trying to get the balance right between, "Skuld is worried about her friend" and "Skuld has a whole lot of complicated emotions about the Mimir-Player situation." (It's, uh…definitely something that's going to take more than one conversation to resolve.) I'm still not 100% sure if I got it down or not, but I also know if I sit on it too long I'll just keep tinkering with it forever, aha, so I figured I'd just release it into the wild.