Chapter Text
Dad is not coming back.
Dad is never coming back.
She sits at the edge of the crater. She's not sure how long. She simply sits there, watching, waiting for nothing, waiting for him to come home and play. Some humans come by and try to speak to her, but she merely sobs, and waves them away when they try to comfort her.
After another bout of indeterminable time, she feels some Startouch elf materialise behind her. Go away! She wants to scream. Don't come here! You took him from me! You have no right to come here! The words get stuck in her throat again, letting out only muffled sobs.
"Leola?" The voice is hesitant, but familiar.
Impossibly familiar. "Dad?" She turns around and stares disbelievingly at the figure. He- they destroyed his stars- did he- is he back?
"Not quite. I'm sorry."
Leola frowns, wiping tears from her face.
He looks just like dad, holding something in his hands. A tuft of purple hair peeks out from underneath a blanket. A baby. "I'm from another reality. One where you were lost instead."
She blinks. It's- possible. She thinks. Dad talked about the possibilities sometimes, about how the world is so very big, and that there could be many worlds, but separate and distant and very different.
"I cannot replace your Aaravos." He continues, a wave of sympathy and regret washing over Leola. "But I would be grateful if I could stay here."
She doesn't know what to do. Her dad is still- still- "dad's not coming back." She feels herself tearing up again. "Ever. Right?"
"No." Another blanket of sympathy. "Or at least I never found a way."
Leola thinks about it more. "But... won't they take you down, too?"
"They can try." For a split second, the world feels heavier, the sun darkens, and a faint roar whispers of danger. It passes.
"I want to go home." She mutters, flapping her hands.
They walk in silence.
It was all a bad dream. It has to be. The sun is shining, and she smells something wonderful being cooked in the kitchen. Pancakes!
Her dad is right there, cooking, flipping delicious pancakes for breakfast. The only thing strange is that the baby is still there, slung across his back, staring curiously around.
Maybe it was not all a dream.
"Dad." She begins. "Where is the baby from?"
"Hmm?" Dad wraps whipped cream and fruits into a pancake. "Ah. The other reality. I suppose he- he would be your brother, there."
The other reality. She pushes the thought away. A bad dream. It was all a bad, horrible, terrible, awful dream. "I have a brother?" She asks curiously.
"Leola." Her dad sets out plates on the dining table. "Do you... remember what happened?"
A dream. "I had a bad dream." She states. "That we were- that the other elves were mean and they- they- you fell."
"Ah." Her dad looks at her strangely. "We should talk about it sometime."
She shakes her head. She just wants to forget it.
He serves the pancakes. She sits, and consumes the delicious meal. Her dad doesn't join, instead appearing to try to feed the baby, which seems very lively and not cooperative at all.
"Can I play outside?" Leola asks, wiping the whipped cream from her face. "I want to show Renna how to float again. She almost got it."
"I'll go with you." He dad immediately states, uncharateristically serious about it. "If you could wait until-" He shrugs a bit, and she assumes he means the baby. It's calmed down a little, and seems less fussy about eating.
"Mhm." She nods.
They soon leave.
Renna gasps when she sees them. "Leola- your dad- he's alright?"
"Of course." Leola points at him. "Right there."
Renna's parents stare at them oddly.
Her dad speaks. "I would speak to you about- events."
"The- the children-" Renna's father starts.
"Is that alright if they play outside?" Her dad says.
"I- yes. Renna. Please go outside."
Leola beams at them.
Renna asks for them to stay close to the house, and she's more quiet than usual. She also doesn't want to try floating again. "Maybe next time." She says.
Leola feels a little hurt- Renna was making so much progress, she was so close to getting it- but she accepts her friend's choice, and they run around and play as imaginary elves and dragons and all is well in the world.
The baby cries a lot. Leola notices it, because her dad almost never leaves the baby alone, and sometimes he will busy himself with things with one hand, and rock the baby with the other, muttering to himself about all kinds of things.
It's alright. Leola knows about babies from her friends. Babies can be finnicky, and they cry, and she shouldn't be jealous of the attention her brother is getting. Dad loves her, she knows. He loves her brother, too. He loves both of them, very very much, and while having a new brother is very unexpected, Leola loves him very much too.
Once, she gets to hold him. He has beautiful bright yellow eyes, though with the tiniest flecks of green in them. They stare curiously at her face, and he babbles at her, moving his arms and fingers. She giggles. He seems to be pouting. He tugs at her hair. After a while, she notices it's a pattern of tugs.
Her dad picks her brother up soon after that.
The crater exists.
It's his temporary form, she convinces herself. He fell and then he reformed. Her dad is fine, alive, breathing, and the half buried bones are remnants of his previous incarnation.
She refuses to talk about it.
Dad wants to talk about it, sometimes. He seems so sad when he looks at the crater, and whenever she says she doesn't want to ever talk about it.
Her friends sometimes want to talk about it, and she refuses them too.
Renna, after some hesitation, does try to float again. She succeeds on the fourth try, and laughs with joy and delight as she wobbles higher into the air.
Her brother grows bigger. He's crawling around now, chewing on things, and the sounds he makes are a lot closer to words. He also makes gestures with his hands. Sign language, her dad called it. Do you want to learn?
She knows a few words now. Hello. Good morning. How are you. Counting a little. Not enough to be able to interpret her brother's speech very well, though. She wonders how her brother knows this strange, unspoken language, but she shrugs it off.
Everything is fine.
Her dad is fine.
Her friends are fine.
Leola is fine, too.