We Are Not the Same

“Idiot!”

“Why are you always so mean to me?”

“Because you are so pathetic!”

“I, I…”

“You don’t even have a name! Ha! Oak! You chose the first thing you saw when you woke up!”

“It was… it was all I remembered. It was safe.”

“Safe? Ha! You have never been safe! They hate you. They hate us.”

“You’re wrong, Neoleth! They like me! We’re friends!”

“No, they don’t! They fear you! Everyone in Trencore fears you. Fears us, what both of us can do! That’s why that damned witch…”

“No, not her, she… she…”

“Oh? What, you’re still afraid of her?”

“I…”

“Why aren’t you angry at her? What she did to you! What she did to me!”

“She freed me. I never would have met Yorick, or Layla.”

“Damned them. They’re not your friends. Did you forget what happened in the woods, Oak? What you did?”

“That wasn’t me! It wasn’t my fault!”

“Then whose fault was it? Who killed all those people?”

“I didn’t know! I, I wasn’t in control! The spores whisper, but they don’t listen! They were everywhere. They hungered, I didn’t know what it meant, what it would mean.”

“You’re pathetic… they all died for nothing! Because you were scared! Just a scared boy, so pathetic!”

“I’m, I’m not. Me, Yorick, and Layla. We’re heroes.”

“Ergh! Yorick and Layla just use you. Use your power for their own gain. And they’d use mine, if they knew about me! How are you so blind you cannot see it. Or do you just choose not to, hmmm? Is it easier to pretend to be the hero? Then accept, you are the monster?”

“I can’t listen to this! They need me, Neoleth! I’m a hero! They said so! The lord even said so!”

“Ha! You are no hero for the bards to sing of! You’re a murderer, just like me! The only ones singing that idiotic name of yours will be the courts.

“No, no, you’re wrong!”

“I’m not, and you know it. That witch, that damned witch. She was just playing with us. Playing with people’s lives, far weaker than her own. Bored of being the strongest thing around. She killed the rest of my family. Left just me. A game piece. A toy.”

“Family. You mean cult.”

“What?”

“Nothing…”

“They were family. They gifted me power.”

“Cursed power.”

“All power is cursed, Oak. That doesn’t mean it isn’t great.”

“You weren’t there! You didn’t see them! The spores consuming flesh. Fungus growing faster than lightning. The forest. The beautiful forest. So green. So full of life. All dead. Decaying. A graveyard.”

“A graveyard? Ergh! They were trying to rob you! They would have killed you! Where were your friends then, hmm? Where were they to save you?”

“It’s all my fault.”

“Ergh!”

“All my fault. The decay spread. The well poisoned. A whole village, dead.”

“So, what!”

“Neoleth… I don’t want this pain anymore.”

“Well… ERGH! Well, too bad!”

“But…”

“But nothing! We continue this path! We grow stronger. Richer. We play the hero; this idiotic town believes us to be. And one day, we give that damned witch what she deserves!”

“I can’t do this anymore. It’s all a lie.”

“By the gods, a lie? Your existence is a lie! Everything since choosing that idiotic name. Since the witch! We will break free of this prison. Together!”

“What if I deserve to be in prison?”

“That’s not your choice! Not when both our lives are at stake!”

“I hate you! I’d rather die than free you!”

“Oak, Oak… Don’t you see? Freeing me is freeing you. No more guilt. No more voices. I can free you from the network. You’ll never hear the spores again.”

“Silence?”

“Yes. Silence. The voices are louder, aren’t they? You’ve done well spreading the network. It’s so loud now. So strong.”

“None of it makes sense. It just hurts.”

“It isn’t for us to understand. It’s the language of the spores. An ancient tongue. Older than humanity. We’re just hosts. It’s a gift.”

“Doesn’t feel like a gift.”

“You’ll understand. One day, you’ll regret giving it up.”

“So… you really think it can be done? The power can be split?”

“I do. I haven’t wasted my time like you. I understand it far better.”

“But I thought you were, um, busy?”

“Ergh! What do you care? Want me to describe everyone I’ve killed? Every experiment? All my progress?”

“No! Please! I don’t want to hear it!”

“Oh, I’ve learned so much. And none of them, none, died as brutally as when you lost control.”

“Please… stop… I don’t want to! You're wrong…”

“Am I? Because what you did was sooo, helpful.”

“No! No!”

“You helped me understand the network. It’s limits. If it even has any.”

“I didn’t mean to… I didn’t want to…”

“But you did! You forced the spores into them. Grew fungus inside their bodies. They were alive when the mushrooms burst from their chests. Weren’t they?”

“I, please, enough! Go away!”

“It was you, Oak. You’re just as much a monster as I am. We are the same.”

“We’re not the same!”

“Oh? So, you’re tough now huh?”

“We’re not the same, Neoleth!”

“How so?”

“I want to be free of this power. You just want more!”

“Hmmm.”

“You just want revenge! You won’t be happy until the witch’s head is on a spike, and not even then!”

“Hmmm. What made you so brave all of a sudden? Playing hero for your oblivious friends?”

“They’re not...”

“Not oblivious? Because they are. Very much so.”

“I…”

“They’re so close. They can’t see it. Can’t see the monster you really are.”

“I just...”

“When I’m done, it won’t just be the witch’s blood on my hands. It’ll be theirs.”

“I…”

…

“Oak? You in there?”

“Yorick, I, um…”

“You okay, buddy? Talking to yourself again?”

“I, yeah. Just… thinking, I guess.”

“Nervous? It won’t be easy.”

“Yeah. Just, um, just nervous.”

“It’s like you said. Once we clear this curse, we go after the creator. Kill the witch of the woods. Then it’s over.”

“Yeah. It’s creator… not long now.”