brattylish

Phil wakes up naturally, to his own surprise, two minutes before the first morning hour finishes. It’s still pitch black outside of course, it’s the middle of the night after all, but the fallen angel doesn’t try to go back to sleep. Instead, he turns his communicator off completely, leaving it on the nightstand, before slipping out of bed as quietly as he could, trying his best not to wake up the freshly arrived Missa beside him.

He’s successful in his attempts of not making a single sound; Missa hadn’t even moved a muscle when the door to their shared bedroom creaked open, granted his husband is quite the deep sleeper. Nonetheless, Phil trudges on throughout his home, lights off and steps quiet. As he makes his way to the front door though, he thinks back to why exactly he’s doing this in the first place.

“I need to talk to you, Philza,” he remembers Foolish asking him when they finally had a single moment alone, “There’s something I need to tell you but it can’t be around the others.”

The totem sounded undeniably suspicious with his wording and nervous demeanor, but a certain glint in his eyes made Phil agree anyway. It wasn’t anything of arrogance or malice, far from it, it seemed more like genuine fear and guilt.

Opening his front door, Phil spots a dark silhouette sitting by the edge of the wall. He knows it’s Foolish already, so he doesn’t hesitate to quietly take a seat next to the man, but he does hesitate to speak. This Foolish, the one he’s sitting next to right now, is different.

He isn’t saying anything, or cracking jokes. He isn’t making little noises or barking just to fill in the conversation gaps. He isn’t even jumping around and emoting like the energetic shark he usually is.

This Foolish is quiet, calm, and collected. And that’s fucking terrifying.

“I’m sorry I had to tell you like this,” Foolish speaks lowly after minutes of just staring off into the night sky, “But I just couldn’t bring myself to do it until now… until the very end.”

Phil looks at him confused, “What are you on about, mate? What exactly are you even referring to?”

Foolish, finally, turns to look at the older male with a smile so bittersweet, so painful, it makes Phil’s stomach ache with anxiety. Silently, he hands the older male a piece of aged paper, then turns his head back towards the edge, not daring to turn back.

The avian examines the scroll in his hand, familiar yet dark memories fuzzily forming in his head just by the mere weight of it. He unravels it, and thoroughly reads the latin wording, surprised that his brain remembers the dead language yet can’t seem to comprehend the long words of spanish.

Once he reaches the end, his eyes wonder back to the first sentence and reads the whole scripture again, and again, and again, and again, until the words finally sink in. His anxiety plummets and suddenly, he feels the need to throw up rush past him like a wave crashing against a stoney shore.

"There's no way," Phil whispers in disbelief, "Another war?... in the Aether?"

The elder turns to the totem, who is still unmoving and silent, hand unknowingly crushing the scroll in his hands. Foolish still refuses to look at him and acknowledge the implications this letter is saying, but to be fair, Phil does not blame him for doing so. He would respond the same if he was too forced into submission.

"If they called you for help, then things have gone for the worst, huh?"

Foolish chuckles, but its void of all happiness, "Yeah... Those egotistical fuckers wouldn't recruit a banished lowlife like me unless their numbers were close to none."

Phil hums in agreement. The people in the Aether, the Gods of millions, if not billions of worlds, would never stoop so low as to bring back a person they exiled just hundreds of years ago unless they were oh so fucking desperate. It all just brings a sour taste in Phil's mouth.

"What are you going to do about your family? You told them right?" asks the avian purely out of curiosity, but with one look at the other's expression, he clinks his mouth shut and just stares, eyes as wide as saucer plates.

He watches as the most happy-go-lucky guy on Quesadilla Island breaks down at the thought of leaving his family behind to fight in an already losing war. The image itself brings back a memory that has been so heavily buried in the back of his mind that his body physically lurches forward in pain, unable to comprehend the familiarity of it all.

Because the last time Phil had seen Foolish cry this much was back when he was just a mere child, still frightened of the world before him. So, he simply waits until the shark finishes crying his heart out over the edge of the wall, only interfering to pull him into a fatherly hug despite Foolish dwarfing him with his giant size.

The scene is abruptly interrupted after that, with a loud boom of thunder echoing through the night sky and a crackle of lightning right behind it. The small pitter patter of rain follows as well, as the two pull away enough to see a strange, yet familiar cloud slowly approach them.

It isn't one for the binary codes that like to target their children, though, is it so selfish to wish upon that instead of its real relations?

There's a grimace on both of their faces when they realize Foolish's time is nearly up, that in the next few minutes, the island will lose another one of its inhabitants yet this time around, no one will know of their whereabouts there after. No one except Phil.

"Do you want me to say anything to Leo? Or Roier?" the avian asks as the rumbling cloud before them gets ever so closer, "You have a big family Foolish, people are bound to start asking."

Foolish shakes his head, hand reaching into his backpack and pulling out a faded jewel melded to a chain of pure netherite. It reminds Phil of a pocket watch, but he is certain it is built more like a countdown timer than a clock. Wordlessly, the totem grips one of Phil's hands and places the green emerald into his palm, patting it twice before finally letting go and facing the cloud now just a few feet away.

"Don't tell anyone about anything. Let the others make up whatever tale they decide to do. Hell, if they even want to make me the villain of their story, so be it, I don't care... I just don't want Leo to know I left just to die."

With a angered scoff, Phil responds, "You aren't going to die, Foolish. You are going to survive, and you're going to comeback to reunite with your family. I know you will."

For the first time that night, the elder sees a smile placed on the younger's lips. Foolish chuckles, wholeheartedly this time, but keeps his back towards the only person who could truly grasp the irony of this situation.

"It's funny," starts Foolish, "For once in our long lives, it's you being such the optimist, while I'm over here only thinking about the reality of things."

A loud, thunderous echo emits from the darkened cloud, now sitting idly above the both of them. There is no more time left for the both of them, there isn't ever enough.

With one last look over his shoulder, Foolish waves a lazy hand towards Phil, spouting out his last words before the cloud strikes lightning where he stands, forever ridding the "forgivened" god of Quesadilla Island. The avian quickly writes down the phrase so as to not forget its tellings, for it holds more hope than that of expected anguish.

"If the jewel dims, then you'll know that my time has come to an end. However, if it still shines the same green as my eyes, then place it a body of water when things here get a little too rough, okay?"

--

i started writing this literal so fucking long ago so the writing isn't as cohesive as i'd like it to be. I also lost interest in the concept and couldn't bring myself to write it to its full potential so a good portion of the end is just nonsense I spouted just to finish this project lol.

essentially the concept was that q!foolish gets sent to the aether to fight a war, q!phil is the only one who is told about it bc he's most familiar with gods and goddesses alike, and if q!phil deemed a situation dangerous enough, he'd be able to call q!foolish, along with his demigod powers, back to the island for a brief period to provide aid.