for @dark-ages-week organized by @pennerjones
Clockwork once wore the Ring of Rage. While he knew his beloved had reached a point of no return, making redemption impossible without drastic action, he understood Pariah had to be stopped; yet, he did not know what the Seven planned.
His core was too intertwined with his loved one's, merged as one, vibrating, and pulsating at the same rhythm. Sealing the tyrant away would be like tearing a piece out of their existence, leaving their essence broken, shattered, and never healing.
But he could not stop them in time.
The Observants had held him back. They had a mission of immediate importance. But it was a ploy, a trap, a scene of refrain, preventing him from reaching the battlefield until it was too late. Even time manipulation was worthless; Clockwork was drained from rushing, and the event solidified into never-chancing.
Pain and betrayal swirled within him, swelling, gurgling.
The realm lionized the victory, their relief a song, a prayer of gratitude, reverberating through the endlessness, promulgating the conquest of the mad monarch. Only one remained alone, forgotten, and wordless.
The heavy armour clanking stopped beside where Clockwork mourned, shedding tears no one could see. He had fallen to his knees before the sarcophagus of eternal sleep, arriving unnoticed by anyone. No one had seen his absence either, but they must have known that keeping him away was key to their success. He would have stalled them, begging for reasoning and an alternative—something they could not allow.
"They will never understand," the knight said. "They made the King a threat. A mistake they'd never admit."
Clockwork knew that. Pariah Dark was not always a menace. His reign was a desperate bid for control, a defence against the limitless, a step to protect him.
In the distance, a mass cheered, losses ignored at the moment of sweet triumph.
A hand reached out. Clockwork accepted it. Fright Knight pulled him up from the cold tiles. Beneath the helmet, the soul observed those afar, engaged in celebration.
Clockwork could not feel more distant from them.
Then, the knight opened his other palm; the Ring of Rage a beacon in the silver.
"They don't deserve it," the knight implied.
Clockwork hesitated, but he could see pain exploding. Revenge too strong, too tempting to resist.
It was their fault. It was their fault his core was cracked to bide the storm of chaos.
They took away everything.
He saw timelines—ones in which he would remain enslaved by the Observants, ones in which he would be a hermit in a faraway lair. Ones in which he would assist in reaching others' happy endings.
The pain of betrayal was too suffocating; they knew what the two of them shared.
Clockwork pinched around the Ring, its poison tingling. He fiddled with it, then red eyes flashed with hot rage at the knight, grateful.
A timeline cleared before him, a timeline where he made them pay. And the ring burned with purpose.
