ELYSIUM

FATHER WINTER 2

WHAT WOULD YOU DO for those you love?

kill for them? die for them?

travel to the great beyond to bring them back?

only few have had the chance. even less have carried it out. but those who believe they are doing it for the ones they love do not understand the depth of what’s at stake.

illeana reyes may say ALEXANDER STONE was her everything. that it is why she weathered the BORDERS for him instead of the countless others who have passed. but is he the same person?

he exists now. resurrected. but even that did not stop the passage of time between when he departed and when he reappeared. a sacrifice very few are willing to make.

immolation he would suffer until even his ashes drifted to the wind.

but there is something they do not consider in their plight to reclaim what has been lost. for dying kills the soul. death changes people. for better or worse, they are never the same. isolated by something no one else can truly understand.

which is why he never gives in to the temptation.

TAPU FINI ushers the barrier to the afterlife. able to converse and sponsor those who look to return. briefly under the lull of a full moon. but those people are never the same. hollowed by misery. changed as the importance of their life is extinguished in hindsight.

she too, would be changed.

which is why he never gives in to the temptation.

for all her glory. for all that he thinks of her. for the pedestal he hoists her on, admired for everything she is and was. he cannot face the fear that his image of her will crumble. slandered by the post mortem remains of whatever he can scavenge.

would he still love her? would she still love him?

could she? after all he’s done. after all he will do. in her name. in her memoriam. how much would she know? how much could she see?

would she be proud?

he’s not sure. there’s no way to know. and that, is the greatest fear of all.

which is why he never gives in to the temptation.

but this is different. this is not a soul that has been tarnished with death. nor a person rebuilt in their past image. it is them. full and whole. rewind to the very beginning of a story that he knows in full.

there is no change. no bastardization to sully her glorious image. all he has to do is relive the path forged ahead. give him this small pocket in time to savor once more before duty and destiny rips it all away from him.

had he not earned it? was this not his right?

temptation beckons. and for once, he gives in.

unaware, that he knows her from back then, and as she was. it is the experiences they lived and the growth they understood that makes her, her.

for what he remembers is romanticism of his own perversion. an idol chiseled out of rosy pink glitter. misty in the cloud of his own eyes.

he has them both now.

but he has never been so blind.

it may have been a whisper to the world, but for me it was the loudest thing my heart could've ever heard and the hardest it would ever would hear.

[attr="class","spiralpee"]

ELYSIUM

FATHER WINTER 2

when you have truly loved someone
when you have given your whole heart
when you have dedicated your soul
your entire life to them

you lose a part of yourself
something that can't be recovered

like a coin tossed into the wishing fountain
or like a bird let out of its cage
only to never turn back

even the best part of our self can betray us

you may try to recollect yourself
all those broken pieces
all those memories
happy
sad

no matter how hard or how thorough you try
there will be fragments you cannot reclaim

the memories you have created
the time you have spent
the love you have craddled

when you walk a certain street
when you smell a certain fragrance
when you taste a certain meal

past memories etched into your soul
surface again
come rushing back to you
forever a part of you

—keay nigel

ELYSIUM

FATHER WINTER 2

MUST YOU BECAUSE YOU CAN? or will you because you must?

this time, her words do not bring him a profound sense of enlightenment. instead, they bring a bitter withdrawal that surfaces from years of martyrdom. for who else proclaims his words?

i do it because i must.

i do it because i am the only one who can.

words imparted from his father. the only thing he still touts from a family that has abandoned him. a curse from his blood. trauma that she had once unwound.

but the salve only last as long as he applies it. re-medication is a must. before the virus can become resistant and immune. but when she leaves him there is no one left to administer it. which is why it grows strong. why it takes over his life and everything he knows.

he holds it even now as he sits in the kitchen, reading old books of lore, entertaining lessons she has already taught him. she is none the wiser, he says to himself, as he plays his part. but he cannot follow the script of his last life perfectly. he makes mistakes. amendments. improvisations. and it spoon feeds new conversation.

births someone who he knows but also does not. for people are shaped by their experiences. distinctly different by the way the wind takes them.

she is not his elysia but she will do.

for an elysium will do just as good.

even the stars can be hidden behind the clouds, but when they are revealed, they’re breathtaking.

[attr="class","spiralpee"]

ELYSIUM

FATHER WINTER 2

THE WORLD DOES NOT REVOLVE AROUND ANY ONE PERSON, she says. no matter who they are. or what they can do. because even if that was the truth, to admit it would take all the magic away. for the soul is shackled to our illusion of free will.

we must believe it to discover what we can do. to how far we can push ourselves. to understand what it means to be us.

he thinks about those words as she snuffs the candlelight by their bedside. mulls what that means when this world prospers without him. for she does not leave him this time around. he stops her.

moves the world beyond its great axis, to prolong what time they have left.

and it is better for it.

there is no fernando silph.

no one to let rocket scatter the silph family. to give them the edge they need to ramp up momentum in their conquest of kanto.

which is why the region never falls. MATIAS SILPH rises in his place. surrounded by the capable children that have been bred as his replacement.

which means they never spread to hoenn. not with the same waves that had crashed onto SLATEPORT in their first great invasion.

key players never move from their spot on the chess board. moves are never taken in account of turning pawns into queens. the world remains simple.

free from gods and aliens. untouched by planes and universes.

all because he does not take action.

we are all specks of dust screaming for our existence in this world. some, louder than others, but all quiet whispers in the great passage of time.

[attr="class","spiralpee"]

ELYSIUM

FATHER WINTER 2

WHEN I DREAM, i swim through the ocean but the waves are made up of stars. each one twinkles with stories of the past. chapters we have forgotten. tales that slip through my fingers as i wade father away from shore. and when i can’t swim any farther, i float on my back, in awe of a sky full of words and whispers.

what do you dream of, nando?

i dream of you, he thinks but never says. for he never has the chance.

everything they’ve been through. every day they have lived, flashed before him. sped up in a fast forward that plays before his very eyes. but he has no agency here.

he knows this. he recognizes this. but he cannot do anything but play observer. a victim of his own perspective as sleep paralysis crushes him in a brief flash.

because he can feel it slipping. that all his time away now becomes an incomprehensible blur as he is torn away from their shabby little life in sootopolis.

he can see the UNOWN revolve around him. see the fear in her eyes as admiration starts to flower in her curiosity. she is scared, yes, but never afraid. the world has proven too wondrous for her to shy away from its great mystique.

what’s happening, she says with her eyes.

his lips move but no noise comes out. move, his mind screams, but his fingers refuse to move. he lays there, in stasis, as his memories start to breakdown between the life he has lived and this second chance that threatens to replace it.

no, no, no, no.

in his final moment, he breaks free, hand thrust out to reach for her.

i won’t leave you again, he screams.

and then he’s gone.

leaving the one asylum that has ever given him peace.

[attr="class","spiralpee"]