Chapter Text
"Simon?"
Above loomed the Tree, spidery limbs stretching out and out, its pointed and lethal ends concealed by metallic leaves. They swayed unnaturally, leaves sighing in applause in a room with no wind, the red-orange crest of Mars' horizon cutting bright in the distance.
"Simon? Are you listening, child?"
His wide eyes could not take enough of the vast canopy in, head craning back, neck bunching uncomfortably as he tried to process the sheer breadth of the Tree. His mouth was open, tongue pressing against the lower palate of his jaw to make room for the sensory information of his eyes.
A shadow passed over his vision, forcing him to blink and recoil, a heavy hand sinking onto his thin shoulder like an impossible weight. He held his breath, stomach lurching, as a robed figure kneeled slowly before him, the weathered face of the Father consuming all sight of the Tree.
"Simon," It came low, gravely, absolute, "What is it that takes you from my lessons?"
"The um... The Tree, Father," Simon slowly hedged out, fighting the desperate urge to twist and pinch at his fingers, flushed hot with shame, having been caught ignoring the holy scripture the Father took precious time to read. There was no punishment, this time; instead, a slow smile stretched over the Father's mouth, not quite meeting his eyes.
"It's beautiful, isn't it?" Simon gasped at the observation, squeezing his fingers in his palm.
The Father didn't look away from his face, waiting for something. Simon bobbed his head emphatically, still unable to see the leaves, the branches over the wide shoulders of the Father. Again, the Father's voice came upon him, crashing down like a gavel, "Nothing else in the universe compares. That is why we must preserve it, we must be the Last Tree's emissaries, fulfil our destiny as the Children of Eden, as said in scripture, and nourish the earth with the rot it craves," Slowly, the Father turned and lanced Simon with his gaze, the metal wire frames of his glasses catching on the greenhouse dome lights, "Do you understand what must be done of you, Simon?"
Slowly, the boy nodded, skin white hot, stomach turning with sickness.
"Say it to me, child."
"I must..." Simon swallowed thickly, trembling beneath the hot iron of Father's palm, "I must... must feed-"
"Feed?" Father's voice was sharp, sharper than the knife pressed into Simon's hand.
"Must nourish," Simon corrected, voice small, airy, "The roots of the Holy Tree, and provide- provide unto it the coveted rot-" Simon hiccuped around the word, eyes hot and wet.
"Continue," Father's tone twisted, his hand shifting slow and serpentine from Simon's small shoulder to fan over his chest,
"For-" Simon gasped, tensing up as fingers dug into the meat of his torso, "For the rot is the sacred substance by which the Tree-"
"Finish it," Simon flinched, whining low in his throat at the hissed vitriol of the Father, greenhouse light shining horribly bright off the wire frame of his glasses, off the flat of the knife in his small hands.
"I-" Simon gasped, hot tears spilling down his round cheeks.
"Fulfil your purpose!"
"I don't want to," Simon whimpered, shaking his head and trying to back away, whining shrill as Father snagged his little arm.
"You are a Child of Eden!" Simon squeezed his eyes shut, face crumpling as tears fell in hot waterfalls.
Somewhere, in the greenhouse, his denial was echoed.
Father's voice dipped into fiery rage, "Do not be an animal of sin!"
I don't want to, Father.
"Do not deny the covenant of your brothers!"
Please don't make me.
"Do not deny your sacred duty!"
The knife in his hand bites, it drips pre-emptively.
Father's voice echoes loudly in his ears, a klaxon that repeats into a garbled demand to move.
Simon sucks a breath into burning lungs, hellfire in his throat.
"You are the hands of the Last Tree!"
Numb, vision blurred, Simon obeys as he always has. He lurches forward, hissing through his teeth, narrowly focused on the cowering form of his ordained target. The sustenance, the sacred rot-
"Finish it, Butcher!"
Simon pitches forward, wheezing, choking as he mounts and pins down the body. It is thin and frail and hot, it clambers against him, hands pushing but not scratching, not fighting. Knees knocking against Simon's back as they kick out, their own choked sounds bouncing off the clinically white walls.
Simon stares down, raising the too-sharp knife to where the throat should be, ready to perform an action ingrained in the very fibre of his muscles.
"Please-" Soft, distant, the prelude to the damning sound in his head. Something screams in his ears, a hot prickle at the back of his neck, molten tears spilling from swollen tear ducts, they plink down onto the essential vessel below. Simon follows their path and freezes.
Ugly, heinous, corrupted blood mixes with bright pearl-gold ichor, it pools and smears and infects-
Simon stares down, uncomprehendingly, at the white swirling void above the edge of his glass knife, weeping gold, flanked in a halo of wings. The tiny limbs flap wildly, loudly, feathers shaking loose in the stress. A hand of porcelain, thin and delicate and perfect encloses desperately around the wet bandages of his wrist, shaking against the weight of him.
An angel, it has to be.
And Simon sat, knees braced about the being's waist, with a knife to its throat.
Simon drew in a ragged gasp, flinging himself from the holy messenger, glass knife clattering to the floor, his bloody palm smearing on the ground as he struggled to crawl away. The angel doesn't move, its own hands coming up to grasp its throat, white-gold ichor dripping from the white void of its head.
"Forgive-" Simon wheezes out, "Forgive me," His body is numb, his body is static, he is within and stuck behind his eyes and he cannot beg loud enough-
"Angel I have greatly sinned-" It comes out like a rush of water, the prayer of penance, the screamed thing from a whipped body, the only permitted mercy in the face of disobedience, "In my thoughts and in my words, in what I have done-"
The angel pushes up from the ground, a laborious movement, delicate white winged halo flapping with the effort. Ichor drips, plinking too loud in the rush of Simon's ears, his blood racing in his veins, vile and sick and ruined.
"Through my fault, my fault, my grievous-" Simon cries freely, babbling to the holy entity that slowly approaches, beautiful and terrible as it comes to stand before him. Simon claws at himself, at his bandages, at his wet chest, at the white electric heat of his shoulder, and screams as the angel descends.
The holy touch burns brighter than anything he's ever felt, and it is too much.
Simon doesn't have the strength to withstand it.