 |
| Commissioned by Crow T. Robot |
The ocean was barren, as it had been for the past 20 years[1]. A desert with the wind howling and the dust forming clouds mere feet above the land. Still, it would always would always be the Ocean to Rose. She remembered when she first visited it with Pearl. It was before the war, when she was young and foolish. When she thought nothing of others, only of herself. When she was always happy, even when she was sad. Now, older and full of regrets, her mind wanders wistfully to those halcyon days.
Her nostalgia is broken by the sound of footsteps. They’re close by, not even walking distance. They shuffle on the ocean’s floor like falling dominos. Each creak of footfall a plan foiled, an empire fallen, a world ended. Rose felt a shiver as the figure walked. He didn’t walk towards her, she was thankful for that. But she also wanted to know where they were. Something inside of her drew Rose Quartz to this figure.
The figure was cloaked in a robe made of midnight. His bald head reflected the morning sunlight. He walked with a slight limp, though he often forgot to do the limp[2]. Along his side was something that could easily be mistaken for a scythe, but he often corrects people, claiming it’s something far less mundane than it actually is. He smiles a slight, melancholic smile, almost glued to his face. It takes him a moment to come out of his own nostalgia to recognize he’s being watched.
IT’S A BIT RUDE, he says in a slight baritone, TO SPY ON OTHER PEOPLE.
“Oh, sorry.” Rose said with a slight bit of anxiety hidden by centuries of bravado. “I didn’t mean to spy. I just wanted to say hello.”
OH, IS THAT ALL? He sighed, slightly.
“Rose Quartz,” she said, sticking her hand out to be shook. She wasn’t sure why she felt off saying those two words. They were her name after all. Yet saying them to the man in black felt like she was lying. No, not lying, she thought. Telling a half truth. She was far more than just another Rose Quartz. And yet, at her heart, she was Rose Quartz. She declared herself Rose Quartz, behaved like Rose Quartz, and lived deliciously. But there was a part of her that didn’t feel like she could ever be Rose Quartz. A part that was still the sad, lonely gem trapped in a system of cruelty. She wanted to believe herself more than she was, or thought she was. But-
BILL DOOR, he said with far more certainty. It was a lie, that much Rose could tell. He said it with too much gusto, like a line from a play he had practiced for hours on end[3]. Rose was slightly suspicious of the lean man, a head taller than her, but expressed none of her concerns verbally. Instead, she said
“What brings you to the Ocean?”
THE OCEAN? Bill scraped his foot along the dry seabed. THERE’S NOT A DROP OF WATER HERE.
“There used to be, a long time ago. I’m sure the water’ll come back when it’s feeling better about herself.” Rose let out a humorous chuckle. She avoided his gaze out of habit. Bill was the first person to ever lay eyes on her alone. For a while, she and Pearl were inseparable. After the War, even more so. It wasn’t until their argument that Rose and Pearl spent some time apart. Rose would travel for a while still, before they reunited, meeting new and interesting people along the way[4].
WAS IT SOMETHING I SAID, Bill asked with a degree of concern.
“No, no. It’s just… what is that stone you’re standing by.” Bill smiled a rather warm, yet sad smile. The kind often seen at funerals and weddings alike on the faces of those who aren’t the most important people in the room.
AN OLD FRIEND. Rose approached the stone with a degree of apprehension. It was covered in dried moss and dust. As she parted the remains of life, she make out a word on the stone. She didn’t quite know what the word meant, but she would come to learn it to be synonymous with a cleansing breeze. The stone appeared to have been there longer than Rose had. The words were beginning to decay with time.
“I’ve heard of these. I think they’re called Gravestones. Bit odd to see one as old as this.”
YES, THEY WERE QUITE POPULAR IN THE OLD WORLD. ALWAYS LIKED THEM. A SIGN THAT YOU WERE HERE.
“The old world?” Rose let out slight laugh that could easily be mistaken for a sigh.
IT’S BEEN A WHILE SINCE I’VE BEEN THERE.
“Can’t say I feel the same.”
YOU’RE FROM THE OLD WORLD?
“An old world,” replied Rose with a light knowing smirk. Bill didn’t fully get the joke.
SO… WHAT BRINGS YOU TO THE OCEAN.
“I’m… picking something up.” Bill looked at Rose. He recognized that tone from so many people. A cop trying to drink his guilt away; an authoritarian trying to make a kinder authority; a man who should have been dead, but always heeded the call of the working man. They would all meet their ends in the end, eventually. But it was the one that he stood before that Bill felt he needed to honor. “Over there.” Rose pointed at the structure a mile or so away. It should have been in the shape of a “T,” but the left side had been crushed by the weight of time.
MAY I ACCOMPANY YOU? I BELIEVE I HAVE SOME BUSINESS THERE AS WELL.
Rose smiled a rather sad smile and agreed. They walked in silence. Not because they had nothing to say to one another. Rather, it was because they had too much they could be saying to other people. Apologies, thank yous, screams of anger, cries of sorrow. But they weren’t with those people, so they walked in silence. Bill wondered if Rose knew what she was about to do. That sad, melancholic tone implied more than he thought she’d want it to. Maybe she did understand those thoughts and wanted them to come true. It was her choice, he supposed, he couldn’t make it for her.
They arrived at the shrine, the windows still as pristine as ever. Beyond the broken hallway, the inside was still as perfect as ever. Like a retail store from hell, the halls were too perfect. Within the shrine, were a collection of clocks. Hourglasses made from the remains of countless gems. Most existed to be traps for would-be-archeologists out to make a name for themselves by discovering time travel. Rose gently lifted the clock, barely larger than her arm, off the table. As she expected, while the room did shake, the drought prevented the sea from taking the shrine away.
Eventually, she came across a small glass ball with an hourglass inside. Bill made an inquisitive noise. “It’s… an old family heirloom. Supposed to help people out in times of trouble.” Rose said no lies in that moment, though she could see that Bill recognized the lack of context she provided. Before saying anything, Bill pulled out an hourglass of his own. It wasn’t shaped like a traditional hourglass. It had two heads on the top, one slightly larger and flatter than the other. Once upon a time, it twisted and curved into itself, less a statue and more an Escher design in suffering. Now, it merely had two heads. Bill placed it on the table beside him.
HE WASN’T THE BRAVEST OF PEOPLE, NOT REALLY. HE WAS A COWARD, A FRAUD, AND A BIT OF A JERK. He smiled the way only a skeleton can. AND YET, I MISS HIM. USED TO SEE HIM ALL THE TIME, RUNNING ABOUT. FAILING TO STAY OUT OF TROUBLE, NO MATTER HOW HARD HE TRIED. HE DIED QUIETLY, IN HIS SLEEP. I ALWAYS THOUGHT “ONE OF THESE DAYS, HIS BAD LUCK’S GOING TO CATCH UP TO HIM. A DRAGON WILL BURN HIM ALIVE, A SPELL WILL GO WRONG, OR SOME KNIGHT’LL JUST STAB HIM.” I’M NOT DISAPPOINTED THAT HIS DEATH WAS SO QUIET. EVERYTHING ENDS, EVENTUALLY. BUT… He pause, uncertain of what he’s saying.
“You wish it hadn’t happened so soon?” Bill smiled at Rose. And then, Rose asked, “But what if you could undo it? Fix all the mistakes you made, make more time available for you and him? Why not give justice to the people who deserve it?” Rose wasn’t sure why she said that last part. Maybe it was because she was thinking of Bismuth or Pearl or Pearl. She looked out the window of the shrine. The sun glistened on the hourglasses, ornate and indigo. She thought of the Diamonds, of Spinel, of all those who died on worlds she never set foot on.
NO ONE GETS SECOND CHANCES. THERE IS NO JUSTICE IN THE UNIVERSE. THERE’S JUST US. Bill let out a small solitary chuckle. IF YOU COULD GO BACK IN TIME AND FIX THINGS, OTHER THINGS WOULD STILL BE BROKEN. YOU HAVE TO MOVE FORWARD, BEYOND WHAT’S BEEN DONE TO YOU. WHAT YOU’VE DONE TO OTHERS. OTHERWISE, YOU’RE NEVER GOING TO LEAVE THAT MOMENT.
Rose said nothing. She looked at the strange man in black, his eyes blue with the infinite of the stars, his smile a bit forced, his face bald. He stood there, as if expecting her to say something in response. They stood together for a good couple of minutes. Then Bill walked away, out the shrine and towards some other business. Rose looked at the thing in her hand, a ball of glass with all of time and space to her beck and call. She sighed before placing the ball on the table[5]and walking out to an uncertain future.
[1] It would take another five centuries for the waters to return to the Ocean. Rose would spend many days and nights wandering its depths, be it alone or with the survivors.
[2] It is often speculated as to why he fakes a limp. Some have claimed it’s to make humans feel as if he is one of them. Humans often have ignored large swaths of a person so long as there’s a single characteristic to latch onto. From limps to hunchbacks to a snappy sense of humor, the human mind can be easily distracted with artifice.
[3] In truth, Mr. Door had only appeared in one play, a minor role as the Grim Reaper in a riff on William Shakespeare’s Macbeth. For a last minute replacement, he did rather poorly. It was as if he hadn’t even read the script before stepping on stage. That the play was a success had more to do with the producers conning the audience into thinking a royal’s nervous breakdown was part of the show.
[4] Pearl, for her part, would mope for a month before being prodded into telling a story. Garnet quite liked her stories while Amethyst put up an artifice of boredom. As the years went on and the oral tradition was supplanted by the novel, Pearl would write her stories for the world to see. She would go through many an agent over the years, ultimately living past them all. Her work would span many mediums from television to prose to comics. Her longest dry spell would be mostly spent avoiding raising a child.
[5] Rose would return to the Sea Shrine three more times in her life. The first in 1201, the second in 1821, and the third in 1913. She would always go alone and never see anyone on her way there. Every time, she would place the ball back on the table and walk away, allowing the sea to consume the shrine.
No comments:
Post a Comment