He bent down and waited for the water to retract before surfacing an oyster. He popped open its mouth to unveil the potential hidden treasure; and fortunately, therein lay a small, shiny pearl. He smiled triumphantly and scrutinized the glistening happenstance for a short moment, then secured it back in his bag with the rest of his findings. It was then when he caught sight of something in the corner of his eyeline— aglimmer in the crepuscular sky.  

He blinked puzzledly, his eyes turned heavenward, watching as a blinding orb of light shot down to be reclaimed by the wax of the currents. His mouth fell agape.  

It was as though the sky had been split asunder; a historic outpour of stars dripping through its proverbial maw and seeping like a bleed of celestial rain. Supernovae galloped, intertwined, and burst in falling meteoroids, streaking across the heavens and coming together in a disseminated thunder of luminescence. It was nothing short of a pure miracle.  

Palpitations heady in his small chest, a firm hand clutched his shirtfront as he dared to draw nearer. The agitated squawking of the seabirds and the soft roars of the waves were reduced to meaningless chatter. Part of him experienced fear: a persistent nag in the curl of his breastbone that spilled and burned white-hot in the pit of his abdomen while his outward expression was one of utter— fascination. It felt like the end of the world, yet simultaneously the beginning of everything.  

Oddly, one of the soaring comets appeared... bigger than its kin. He took another, hesitant step forward until the spumes were practically hugging his shoes as he neared the edge of the seacoast. Something instinctive overwhelmed him, encouraging his arms to unfurl like an invitation as he watched the enormous, falling star abruptly shift its course, now drifting toward him at Mach speed— like an old friend bounding in for a long overdue embrace. Much to his own surprise, he did not shy away from it. 

His ponytail was thrown up as a rush of wind accompanied the impending celestial body. It levitated for a prolonged moment as his hands readied to break its fall. It shattered like a taut bubble. And from the star emerged... a boy. Undeniably close to himself in age, amazement clogging every corner of his expression as their gazes interlocked and lingered, and he could see the profound depth of the cosmos dance within those eyes— a startling medley of red and violet with a splash of ocean blue— until time became unstuck and they toppled back to the ground. 

One of the eyes was scrunched close, the prince assessed as he familiarized himself with his alien contours. A fresh, blotchy scar pervaded the thoroughly singed left of his face. His hair came down in drapes of ethereal silver, reflecting the eminence of the moonlight itself, though it was tousled and replete with bits and scraps of detritus and soot. His attire was— bizarre. He could not pinpoint an exact nationality; a dirtied robe of white embellished extravagantly with gold lineation alongside similar heraldry— no doubt befitting one of an impossibly high rank. Needless to say, he was speechless. The initial thought that crossed his mind was that he had been graced by the presence of an angel— albeit one lacking its trademark fluff of wings. 

They held a long, pregnant stare. In this soundless void that overshadowed the rest of the world— sans the frantic hammerings of his own heartbeat, ensconcing something so vulnerable; a broken-winged bird who ogled him like a basin of water after he had traveled across thousands of sandhills in search of salvation. The anguish in his star-studded eyes was so profound that it left the prince semi-breathless, and he wondered which of those theological devils was responsible for plucking its radiant plumage and sending it crashing down to earth.  

With hesitance, he cupped the boy’s face and ran his thumb in comfort along the unscarred breadth of his right cheek. To the boy, this stray tittle of momentary kindness crashed down with the force of a wrecking ball, bursting open the metaphoric floodgates as his uninjured eye welled with thick tears. Hands came to grip the prince’s shirtfront with astonishing ferocity; a piece of driftwood to keep him afloat as his grimy face came to tuck in the curve of his neck, his frail, damaged body wracked with a sorrowful symphony of sobs and wails.

Momentarily paralyzed, the prince dithered in the doorway before at last locking his hands around the other in return and cradling him as if it was his sole duty to hide him away from the hells and cruelties of the world. His mind scrambled for answers, but he decided that it must be unimportant— peripheral to the broken coo and crushed feathers.  

Beneath a canopy of an endless onslaught of dying stars, the prince tightened his grip around the weeping boy as fingers gently slicked into his scruffy mane to meticulously comb out the knots while he rocked him gently, like his mother parodically would after a particularly grim nightmare back when he was too young to handle them on his own.  

Among all the uncertainties, upon this coast oft-touched by the whims of fate, he did not doubt for a second that this meeting of theirs was anything but preordained. What the gods have envisioned for him, we finite creatures could not hope to ever fathom; however, the heavens had placed this poor, scared consequence into his arms, and with it, an unspoken but patent mission.  

The boy drew back with a sniffle and Prince Roxxy thumbed away the residual wetness with a slide of his thumb. When their eyes reencountered the other, something devastatingly familiar, natural surged in his heart as he choked down a slew of unprecedented anguish— yearning. He regathered him in his arms and nuzzled himself into the crook of his shoulder. This was simply a matter of inevitability. Reminiscent— an old, faceless memory; but as the sun twists on its orbit and around the moon to herald the forthcoming day, so too would their fates inexorably entwine again. 

“I’ll never leave you alone again,” he croaked; the words both his own and not at the same time. ”I promise. I'm so, so sorry. I’m so sorry... Astrophel.”  

 

One could ponder if it was fate. 

Or if it was merely punishment for his own treacheries, the broken-winged boy considered.  

A soft, vulnerable light. A brief taste of pleasure; but indulgence was temporary and dangerously fine. 

It was impudent to hope. This was always destined to be a tragedy, after all. He should avoid reaching out lest history damns itself in its repetition, and everything is lost to him again. He was walking on the edge of a ravine that spelled nothing but his own doom if he considered probing its depths.  

 

 

 

 

Freedom. 

 

... If only he could be free.