Ocean

one.

she meets him first with death.

she has been awake for a long while. for how long— she cannot say, but she has been here, and she is in an oil slick.

(there are many oil slicks in this time— great, churning cities of man. monoliths of buildings, vehicles zipping across the sky like great winged beasts of metal and chrome. she came from the ocean; she knows this, because there will always be salt in her lungs. they mingle with the copper, mingle with the blood, with the dark inkiness of oil that is her lifeblood. this is her. this is who she is.)

not many can see her, which is fine. a part of her wishes to explore— but another wishes to remain. what’s left of the grassy fields, what’s left of the animals. something within her tells that she is borne of loss, and she must devour what she might in memory before she indulges in the greatest loss. she does not know how she knows this. she only does.

a deer has just fallen when she meets him. the reserves of this nature park— or so she has heard the people say, has heard the forest nymphs and the brook horse sing— this place of nature is quiet, and yet full of more animals than she has seen anywhere else in civilization. but peace and quiet does not keep out death, and she watches as the deer— old, now, she had watched it be born and grow and fall ill and now— buckles to its knees, breathing its last by the stream. dark eyes staring up into nothing, unseeing. she crouches on the other side, and breathes in the sinewy wisp of loss.

a rustle in the trees. steps. she peers upwards— there should be no one else here today. she should know. she is the spirit of certain things, though of what things she is not sure— but she knows, and this is an unknown.

more rustling. grass crinkling, bending and breaking. the scrape of wood. and now, this:

limbs. long, sinewous, like the roots of a tree, winding and winding. hooves, much like her own. a body gnarled and entrancing, like the earth itself made living into person— antlers, much larger than her own singular horn. a strange body, of strange, twisting proportions. a crooked neck. leading up slow, slow— a mask, wooden, with strange symbols drawn in inky red. she sees no eyes, but she knows it— he, is watching her. observing.

she knows not what he is, only that the world falls away for a moment while they look at each other. she knows not his intentions, only that she is mesmerized by the curl of his limbs, his hooves, the vines and the ivy that entwine him and wither as fast as they regrow, how each hoofprint left in the grass has left an inky black oil that kills the dirt it touches, only to have the greenery regrow twice as vibrant.

she knows not what he wants, only that she sees him, and he sees her, and she thinks: thou art me, i art thou. what dost thou seeketh, and why dost thou bringeth my afterbirth?

it is a question— a spark. a flicker of a light. a star in her sky set twinkling to light her way— and then he turns his head. his body of twisted earth and vine and dying blossoms turning back to the forests from whence he came. she hears the hooves against soft earth, sees the inky dark hoofprints he leaves behind in rotting grass and blooming flowers, smells the stench of death and rebirth and herself —

she’s watching the trees. she does not know why she is watching the trees, only that she is. she has an odd feeling. a feeling of loss. a different feeling of loss than one she is used to— it feels like she has forgotten something.

and then the feeling vanishes, as the dying deer takes its last breath. she crouches slower, lower, listens to its breathing. hears as its heart beats once, twice— and then its last, and the body stops moving. heat, dissipating— leaving cold where once was life. she watches the loss of its living spirit— and then hears the ground stir. the sound of insects, flies, a wolf in the distance. soon, this body will return to the ground, to the stomachs of others. and in this, its rebirth.

loss, and rebirth. this dear deer.

dear, deer, dear, deer. she closes the deer’s eyes, and then goes to watch the sun melt. there is a star she wishes to search for.

two.

neote city is a rising monolith in the sinking world. everywhere else has their own problems— the rising temperatures of the earth, the slow ascent of water and all it brings, the felled forests, the starved stomachs. but neote city beckoned to many all, in shining lights and its human technologies, tall as it was, grander than any mountain. dear has watched it, seen it grow— knows there is something about it that draws stronger than most other places of the ancients.

still, she circles it. does not approach. dear likes to think she is friendly, she is— amicable, and peaceful, and loving. she likes people, very much so, and neote city is gaining them in abundance. but her heart tells her that it is not her time to approach, not yet— that there will be time, in the future, for her to be among those of that risen land. that the land around her— there is much potential, much life and loss and earth that she has yet to memorize and absorb.

neote city will be important. is important. there is something larger yet, larger than the world has ever seen, coming over the horizon— she feels it. she knows this. some days stronger than most.

it is on one of these days that she meets him again. dear wanders, walks the alleyways between buildings in the dark of night, following a kitten too weak to fight, too sickly to eat. it has a chance, still— but she has a feeling that with or without her interference, it will not see the months to come. she does not know how she knows this, only that she does.

again, the hooves. again, the sound of scraping. she knows not how she recognizes the sound, but she swivels her heard anyway.

a wooden mask. markings, intricate yet simple, in dark ink still wet. limbs skinny, stretched, like a clay sculpture that has melted into disproportionate lengths. ribs poking like cliff rocks, an amalgam of vines and wires and animal entrails. she watches as it— he, approaches. hooves clicking into the empty alley that now seems like an empty world, just between them two. he is mesmerizing, in his morbid elegance; he is beautiful, and a part of her yearns to reach out and touch him. and also, this: familiarity.

have we met somewhere before?

you smell like home.

a car horn blares behind her. she turns. headlights sweep past, and the kitten is gone. that’s fine. she’ll follow the scent. there are days ahead of it yet, and she’s eager to see them.

(another scent lingers within her, but she can’t place what, or where. only that the end is soon. a new beginning;

sooner.)

three.

it is a beautiful, clear day. the breeze is salty out here, though the ocean is nowhere to be seen. it has been missing for hours.

a creature in a mask sits beside her. kindred spirit, says her heart, and their hooves gleam in the afternoon sun. his wires and cables strung like electric lights drape across the wooden bark of her skin, and he smells like battery acid and acrid smoke. she knows not how they got here, only that they are, and they will be, for a time.

will i see you again? after it’s all over?

he does not reply.

it is answer enough.

when the waves come (larger, larger than any mountain, larger than any monolith mankind has ever seen, the ocean blotting out the sky—), dear sits alone.

she is not lonely, though. that much, she knows.

four.

(gasping. crashing. drowning. lifeblood. cresting, cresting, stronger within her than ever and she is larger, larger than life now, larger than she has ever been—

he is the first thing she sees when she breaks the surface of brine and ink and debris, grasping for air and seeing the world reborn.

he watches. she watches back.)

friend.

(when she crawls out beyond the gnarled tangle of roots and wires, she emerges into the world alone, body thrumming with more strength than she has ever felt in her life. the world is a crash of greys and blues and the colours of which have not yet been seen by human eyes, once hidden in a chest in the centre of the world, debris and glass and flesh—

cities stand amongst the afterbirth.

dear breathes.)

five.

the world rebuilds. it heals, and it adapts, and dear watches it all with rapt admiration, and adoration, and trembling love.

she still wanders the wreckage of the word, though she does venture into the cities these days. the crowds of people, the scent of desperation mingling with the dogged sheer will to survive, to live — it is as intoxicating as the ruins around them, these pulse points of life. among the debris and the sunken cities, of fallen gods and drowned souls— she is home there, too, dancing amongst the rubble and feeling the water in her lungs. this is where she was always meant to belong, and she knows this, though she knows not how.

she sees, before she hears, for once— green, in a world where that has become a rarity. it makes her pause from her place among the wreckage, alone amidst the sea— she is the only soul out here, but she has never felt lonely— and he emerges from the ocean, like a starved seagod. gnarled limbs, stretched to clawtips, dark at the ends like pale firewood burnt. there is moss and seaweed, the sheen of oilspills on his alabaster, emaciated body— there are antlers, and a wooden mask that stares.

he is quiet, and all she feels is a sense of home. a sense of love. a sense of memory, and she can’t help the smile as she raises a hand in a wave.

he watches her, from across the murky blue waters, clear as crystal, cold as a frozen lake.

and then he waves back.

later, as she dives back down beneath the blue deep and swims back to the city, she’ll remember the wreckage. will remember the expanse of ocean, far as the eye can see. and she’ll remember feeling at home.

there’s something else, though, that she knows she can’t remember. knows, somewhere within her soul, a corner in the corner of her night sky— there’s something she has forgotten.

but she doesn’t mind. she knows it will all be okay. she doesn’t know how, but it will.

six.

and then, on a day of sunshowers, dear meets sakana.

and then: 

she finally knows.

seven.

she smells him before she sees him, this time.

she recognizes the scent. would know it anywhere, like the back of her palm. recognizes and remembers the smell of wet earth, of tree bark. of cold raindrops on mossy stones, of vines and leaves. of animal fur, of decaying meat, of oil and death and loss and of rebirth. she breathes it in, and knows it intimately, more than anything in her soul.

she knows what her past smells like. and she knows him.

a part of her— the still mortal part of her— wonders how he found her, here, and her tree home in the middle of the endless ocean. the rest of her, the rest of her that knows now, doesn’t bother questioning. kindred spirits, she now remembers thinking once— in more ways than one. he is like she is, and she is like he. except now she knows. now, she remembers.

he looks just like how she imagined he did, almost like the personification of nostalgia. the wooden mask, the gnarled limbs of ash and wood, the vines and seaweed and oil and decaying flesh. he watches her now like she’d watched him then— anyone else would be wary of a stranger entering their home. but she is not anyone, and he is no stranger.

instead, she smiles and says, “hello.”

he doesn’t reply.

that’s alright. she climbs down from the place on the shelves, her own hooves clicking on wooden floorboards as she approaches. slowly. politely. watching. (for the first time, in all this time— he seems tangible to her. and it may be because she knows, now. what he is, what he represents, what he’s meant to be. she knows, as she will know most things that have existed, and she will continue to learn.)

“it has been awhile.” she says. “how have you been?”

he tilts his head. every movement sends a whiff of forest pine and wolf fur to her, and it smells like home.

“i see,” she smiles, moving to sit cross legged on the floor, “i’m glad. you know— a part of me would apologize for forgetting. but the rest of me knows that nothing else could, should, be done. and i know now. as i’m sure you do too.”

he takes a step forward to her. his hand is as rough as the wood of her skin, blackened to ash where the fingers are. she hums.

“from life to death is a negligible distance when compared to the path that separates the born from the unborn,” she says, peering at him with all her eyes. “for us, though—  there is no distance, is there.”

she extends her hand. he extends his.

she smiles, and closes her eyes.

“i’ll see you again, pyrit.”

when she opens her two eyes again, she’s once again alone in her tree home. there’s no one before her, though her hand remains outstretched. when she stands, each scrape of her limbs is almost cacophonous in the emptiness of the space she resides in— she is alone for miles and miles, with no one else in sight.

but that’s alright. it is more than alright. because she’s alone, but she’s not lonely. she has her love within her soul, and the guidance of her elders within her being. with her new role in this universe, sakana residing within her, alongside the souls and memories of all the witches that have come before her— she will never truly be alone again.

and as she walks back to the shelves, her fingertips still feeling the residual warmth of another hand in it, still carrying the scent of earth and flesh and ash and oil and birth — she smiles, because she knows this:

she was never truly alone at all.