Chapter Text
Shadow Milk Cookie was no stranger to his own immortality. As with everything. Of course he was baked with all the knowledge he could ever need on Earthbread.
Of course he was the one who had to hold his screams within himself as the witches stared down at he and his fellow virtues, with full knowledge that if he were to even flinch the entire batch of his… companions? Would be discarded. He was the fount of knowledge, for crying out loud. This burden was a given.
Or at least, he was–
In anycase, he was the one who had to guide the rest of the former virtues– Mystic Flour, Burning Spice, Eternal Sugar, and Silent Salt– to teach them of their purposes.
He taught them to the best of his ability, which was admittedly not very well considering they were his first students. In addition to this, he was also extremely bad at walking, even for someone fresh out of the oven.
Finally getting through his painfully amateur lesson, with help from the other virtues to teach him how to walk, he felt a hole in his chest as they all left to fulfill their purposes that he told them to fulfill. It must have been so greedy of him– that he knew. To want to take and take, just to… talk?
Present Shadow Milk Cookie would laugh at the notion…
Probably…
The first time he “tested” said immortality wasn’t out of any depression or crumbling mentality or spiraling insanity or crushing loneliness. He just didn’t eat.
Back when Shadow Milk still had even a sliver of hope that his old life would be reachable again. Burning Spice had finally snapped, bringing pure destruction instead of balancing his destruction with a new abundance of resources for the next generations.
He locked himself deep in his spire of knowledge, desperately curiously looking through his deep libraries of published books in order to find a “cure” to his friend’s corruption.
At least, he hoped they could still be friends, even if this corruption was incurable.
At least, he hoped he considered him a friend before corrupting.
In a sick sense, staying in his spire and doing nothing but rehashing his expansive knowledge for his own brain to see brought Shadow Milk sustenance.
It felt so good . Like he was finally doing something right. It was so, so, so much better than his other outlets for times when he just… couldn’t take being the fount of knowledge. When he couldn’t take the suffocating pressure of being the sole guide to the virtues without any guide for yourself.
Without any sort of close family.
Sure, the beasts sometimes came over, and they were the closest thing Shadow Milk had to a family– not that he would ever admit it– but the occasions in which the virtues all had enough time to just hang out were few and far between.
No wonder, Shadow Milk had thought at the time, no wonder Burning Spice corrupted, I can’t bear feeling this void either .
Present Shadow Milk would’ve laughed at the notion…
Probably…
These expectations from the witches, virtues, and cookies– witches , there were so many of those little cookies, all with blabbering mouths that just couldn’t stop moving – terrified Shadow Milk to the core.
His mind would fill with doubt and at times he couldn’t think about anything else or even see what was right in front of him. He would often excuse himself and rush off to the bathroom when these attacks happened in public, and press his nails into his skin until it bled.
These attacks at times happened in public, sometimes as he was giving lectures at his beloved academy, and other times– worse times – with his fellow virtues.
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“Shadow Milk, dear, what happened that caused you to run off like that?” Eternal Sugar Cookie asked, concern gently coating her already-sweet voice. Shadow Milk, Eternal Sugar, and Silent Salt were at one of their rare virtue hangouts- this time a picnic, and it was Burning Spice's turn to bring the food.
Although now, Burning Spice had gone rogue and Mystic Flour seldom joined them anymore… if ever . Of course, this time no one had remembered, and it sent Shadow Milk spiraling, surrounded by reminders of his failure as the chaperone of this endless field trip in cookie civilization.
“N-nothing at all! I mean, I just had to go to the restroom is all!” Shadow Milk put on a fake smile that so terribly veiled his inner turmoil that present Shadow Milk would’ve crumbled himself on the spot.
Well, he would if he could. He would’ve a long time ago.
“But dearie,” Eternal Sugar pressed, so sweetly that Shadow Milk’s smile immediately faltered, “you look like you haven’t gotten enough sleep, and you look so thin, a-and–” a tear drops from her eyecing.
“W-woah! Hey, Eternal Sugar, it’s alright, okay?”
Showtime . Shadow Milk shouldn’t have let himself falter like he did. He failed as a guide. He needed to help his fellow cookies, but he couldn’t even help himself. Stupid, stupid, stupid–
Snapping back to reality, Shadow Milk hid his now slightly jam-covered palms that were pricked by his nails, and put on a more convincing demeanor. Maybe this was where he first learnt deceit .
“I’ll get more sleep, mkay? Juuust for you!” He exaggerated his words as he lied through his teeth, trying to cheer the poor virtue up. The one burdened with coming to see him. Eventually, his smile turned into teeth gritting, but it didn’t stop his dizziness.
Everything felt so wrong. He was so lightheaded. It must have been the hunger kicking in again. The more he smiled, and let himself relax, the worse the feeling got. His stomach ached and burned, instead of its usual begging for food. He felt like he was fighting for his life just to exist– and his soul jam was .
After what felt like years– but were actually just a few minutes, Shadow Milk returned to reality with a natural amount of pain for him– that was another thing.
As he was the first virtue the Witches baked, they had underbaked him, making him extra frail. It wasn’t a problem for him– his purpose was simply a vessel for knowledge, after all– so the witches just… let him figure himself out. It was the reason he was so bad at walking- not like the witches thought to bake that knowledge into him despite giving him the cosmic library that is birthright to any fount of knowledge.
Funny thing is, Shadow Milk even had to create his own levitation spell, the witches hadn’t even thought to give him a solution to his own problem that they created.
It worried his peers tremendously, no matter how much reassuring and denying his pain he did. Even when the other 4 were in trouble. Especially then .
This frailty, Shadow Milk hypothesized, worsened as he starved himself. That was the cause of his moment of weakness.
He quickly shook his head and looked up. It appears he had curled up in pain.
Much to his surprise and dismay, Silent Salt and Eternal Sugar were staring at him even more worried now.
“... What are you looking at?” Shadow Milk snarled– why was he so defensive ?
Before the two could respond, another voice, softer than even Eternal Sugar’s cut through the tension.
“You’ve grown thin.” Mystic Flour Cookie noted, eyes still shut. She slowly walked over and put a hand out for Shadow Milk to grab. She’d always been– or at least was– a motherly figure in the group, making her and Shadow Milk quite close– both looking after the 5 of them.
Ignoring her hand, Shadow Milk started to float again ( when had he stopped floating?? ) and grinned from ear to ear.
“Misty!” He sang, beaming at the newfound company and opening to shift topics. “Where have you been? We thought you had crumbled in your wittle pagoda! Making a cocoon to me-ta-mor-phose might befit you since you've stayed cooped up in there that long!” Shadow Milk teased, emphasizing each syllable of "metamorphose". He knew that was mean. It wasn't true. He said it as a joke. It was just a joke.
“Perhaps,” was all she replied with. In another time, she would’ve gently smiled, maybe laughed, voice not so empty, and Burning Spice would insist on ditching the picnic on the little hill with a silver sapling at its center for an adventure. Eternal Sugar eventually started to try and fill Mystic Flour’s motherly role, to a much lesser extent. It just wasn’t in her nature.
Shadow Milk could relate.
In the present, Shadow Milk would’ve given anything just for this greatly reduced version of the virtues’ coveted picnics.
A silence settled in between the four virtues. Eternal Sugar’s hands fidgeted, as if she wanted to say something, but nothing she thought of was deemed worthy in her mind. Her wings jittered slightly, a chill in the wind picking up which seemed to annunciate the void of heat left in Burning Spice’s absence.
Silent Salt was, unsurprisingly, quiet and steady. They were always distant, always behind a suit of armor– but always present even still, seeming to be part of the wind that always seemed to grace their figure, creating a steady creaking of armor that contrasted the silence of the cookie themself. Silent Salt was an anchor.
Mystic Flour was silent too. It was an unexpected development overall, but with her recent lack of enthusiasm or participation in… well… anything … Her silence wasn't unexpected at the picnic. It almost seemed as though she were meditating, or too deep in a train of thought on the other side of Earthbread to ever hope to get back to the picnic in time, despite already being there.
Perhaps, she wasn’t thinking of anything at that moment, apathetic to whatever was going on at that moment.
So, it seemed Shadow Milk would have to bring up something to talk about yet again!
“Uh, Mystic Flour! You didn’t answer when I asked the first time, but what brings you out here?” And not all the other hangouts goes unsaid, but not unheard. Shadow Milk silently curses himself for stuttering at the beginning, his voice wavering throughout the sentence as well. As a guide, he sure is bad at keeping others’ confidence in himself.
“Y-yeah! What’s up w-with that Mystic Flour? Is something wrong?” Eternal Sugar tries to gently put her hand on Mystic Flour’s shoulder, but she shifts away from her, and Eternal Sugar doesn’t push.
“I have been… pondering about the meaning of life.” Mystic Flour confesses. “All my life I have been granting miracles to those in need, but I keep considering alternate scenarios for myself.”
An eyebrow of Shadow Milk’s raises. He himself already knows– and told the virtues– their purposes, as well as cookies’ purposes: to spread their respective virtues, and to be eaten. However, he also told the other virtues– and mostly himself– that although they have concrete meanings of life, it doesn’t mean they can’t also live for other purposes too.
With that being said, he can’t wait to find out another of his friends' perspective. Although, he had a bad feeling considering how isolated she’d been before coming to the conclusion .
“Apathy. All is meaningless,” Mystic Flour declared.
The three other virtues stared at her in silence.
“... Are you serious?” Silent Salt’s quietly asked. Rhetorical or not, Mystic Flour answered.
“Of course. All will return to flour in the end. Why do anything if the result is the–”
“BECAUSE OUR DUTIES! WE WERE BORN TO CREATE, LOVE, CHERISH, AND FEEL !” Silent Salt shouted– probably for the first time any of the three virtues had ever seen if Mystic Flour and Eternal Sugar’s reactions were anything to go off. Silent Salt rarely talked, let alone… This.
Still, Mystic Flour tried to convince Silent Salt.
“You don’t understand. There’s no point in doing if all turns to flour. You see the road’s end but you still move with such vigor. I see no reason to make the latter half of my trip so flashy.” Her voice stayed unshaken, volition seeming to saturate the monotone note she continuously hits when explaining.
“No, you don’t understand. We were baked for our communities– baked as a community. We don’t live for our end, we live for our now, and our future now. And, I don’t mean our as in you for yours or me for mine. We are for each other. That is the way of solidarity.” Silent Salt’s quiet voice, for the first time, wavers with a small tide of rage and betrayal, obviously hiding a much deeper ocean of emotions behind its high walls.
Lots of firsts that day, when it came to Silent Salt, Shadow Milk thinks.
Eternal Sugar, trying to de-escalate the situation, pleads with the two virtues to finish their dispute at more level-headed minds.
“H-hey, guys, let’s just calm down before we–”
“No. I see no reason to continue to argue with someone who will see the truth in due time.” Mystic Flour immediately shuts down her efforts. As she turns to leave, Shadow Milk’s mind starts to panic.
No no no no– he can’t panic like this. Not when she’s about to leave forever just like Burning Spice. In a spur of panic, Shadow Milk excuses himself from the picnic as well– a decision he will be ashamed of in the future– as he portals back to his spire of knowledge, without even looking at whatever the other two virtues had plastered on their face for Mystic Flour, and now him.
Always making things about himself. Never checking on his friends. Letting Mystic Flour corrupt. Silent Salt is probably raging. Poor Eternal Sugar. He just left her to calm Silent Salt down without him– without Mystic Flour or himself there to help her.
How did I get in here? Shadow Milk wonders as he’s already in his bathroom by his bedroom in the spire of knowledge, nails pricking his legs. He doesn’t use them anyways, like a picky brat. Why doesn’t he use what is given to him? What’s wrong with him?
By the time he breaks out of his stupor, he has no idea how much time has passed.
But, his eyes sting, his legs– which he refuses to look at– are sore, and his back is soaked with sweat.
So, he decides to finally wash himself after witches know how long, despite the stinging sensation of hot water hitting his wounds.
Watching his blue jam flow down the drain, he wonders how the rest of the virtues fared. Guess he’d have to ask.