#inspired by that one drawing by cocoabats of the victors

[lunarblazes]

As soon as Ren finally goes down, Scott knows he’s not going to get a last ritual. Who would be there to do it for him? There’s nobody left. He’s got two more harming potions. He casts a silent apology to the still-warm corpse beside him as he prepares for his own death.

There is shockingly little to do. Well, he supposes it’s not exactly shocking, more… jarring. After so long running away, so long being hunted and running and fighting only when necessary, picking battles and choosing allies, it’s strange to finally be able to sit and hear the birds in the forest. The leaves crunch under his feet as he gently sets down the bucket that contains his final friend, Binky the axolotl. The pink salamander seems content as always, bubbling around in his little bucket under the oak tree.

Scott sighs. He does briefly wonder if axolotls have the capacity to say last rights, but then thinks better of it. He wouldn’t know if they did, and they probably don’t. No use wondering about it.

He still feels bad about Ren as he takes out the harming potions carefully. He could have said last rights for Ren. He could have. But the zombies hadn’t left, and as guilty as Scott feels, he doesn’t want to die so uncivilized. He feels like as the winner he’s earned the right to a dignified death. Cleo and Pearl didn’t get that.

Just as Scott’s preparing to do the deed, he hears voices from behind him. He doesn’t turn. He knows everyone is dead, and he’s not about to go his life with that haunted look that Grian held the whole time they were here. He knows, instantly, who stands behind him. Who stood behind him, rather, as technically they’re still dead, and ghosts are just fragments of other, past things that have been shattered, and… maybe he should hurry. Scott’s had too much time to think about the existence of ghosts, apparently.

He does smile and nod, still not turning, so he knows they’re there. He’s proud of them. He can feel their pride too, even if it’s begrudging.

Before he can shatter the first bottle at his feet, a swirling apparition of light appears before him. Scott sighs.

“Hello.”

“Hi,” the apparition says back.

“I was about to kill myself, you know. Kind of important, I’d say.”

“Yes,” it agrees softly, “it is.”

“So…?”

“So?”

“Are you going to… do something? Or are you just here to watch?”

Scott could have sworn the apparition flinches at that. “Oh, um… I don’t think you want to kill yourself, do you?”

Scott considers this. There’s a pit of dread, somewhere deep in his stomach, that instinct that tells you when you’re about to inflict pain on yourself. His survival instinct is still strong, even if he’s alone, and he can’t quite give up hope yet. Even as he holds the bottles that will end him.

“No,” Scott says primly, “but it’s tradition, isn’t it?”

“I suppose so,” it says. It sighs. “You don’t have to.”

“No,” Scott says, “but I think it’s best to move on, isn’t it?”

It flickers for a moment. “Yes, I… yes. I suppose it is.”

A pause. Scott still doesn’t know why this thing is here. It’s not a normal ghost, but it’s definitely dead, even with the glow surrounding its features. He has a guess as to who it is—who it was, in life—but he doubts it remembers that now.

“Do you want another way out? Something bright?”

Scott raises an eyebrow. “I’m listening.”

“I… I think I could get you out. In a blaze of light. Something like that. It wouldn’t hurt. I don’t know if you would… die, but you’d be out of here. And… you’d keep your victory.”

Scott shrugs. What does he have left to lose?

“Sure. I’m tired. I don’t think I really care about the victory at all right now.”

“Yeah, I didn’t either, I don’t think,” it says.

“Could I ask something of you?”

“Mm?”

“Do you know how to bury the dead?”

The spirit nods. “I do.”

“Can you interact with the world?”

“I can.”

“Can you make sure they… they get their funerals? Properly laid to rest. I don’t want weird ghosts wandering the lands that I’ve put there.”

Scott can’t make out the spirit’s face, its features are still blurred and hidden under the shifting light, but he could have sworn it smiled. “Yeah. I can do that.”

“Good. I can… I can leave, now, I think.”

Scott watches as a lightning bolt forms above him, though instead of random bursts of energy reaching for the ground, the bolt feels like hands, reaching forward to hold him. They are here to help. To alleviate his loneliness. To affix him to the heavens, to let him out of the blood-soaked world.

Scott sighs one last time and let the energy take him away. It doesn’t hurt.

The ghosts of the land dissipate with him, all except for the glowing spirit. Scott rests.