Chapter Text
He could still hear the screams, the pleading from Monkey King filled with so, so much pain. MK felt horrible having to do that, but he had to do this, he had to be the sacrifice. But now, to hear this, to hear it was all for nothing! It filled him with anger he didn’t even know he could possess. “Child, you have to understand! This cycle cannot continue if you truly want it to thrive,” Nuwa said, her voice apologetic, but it only angered MK more.
“No! The people of this world are not weak, I will find a way! You don’t get to decide their fates! Neither do I! I won’t let this happen!” He shouted, and with every word, each stone glowed, light shooting out of them and make a circle around him. The staff connects to each light before pulling it to float above to MK’s head. “Child, accept it. You are the Harbinger of Chaos!”
MK shook his head with a smile on his face. “No... I’m just MK, the Monkie Kid.” He slammed the staff on the floor beneath him, creating a large crack enough to jump in and not get stuck. Xiaotian jumped in, not bothering to hear whatever Nuwa had to say. He saw the pillar cracking and tried to the stones to try to repair it. He felt relief when it did, but panicked when it didn’t stick. He tried again but the stone exploded him. His vision was blurry as Wukong caught him.
“I.. ot… u… I got you..” He barely heard Wukong say at first. To hear one of his father figures the second time was relieving and comforting. Xiaotian let tears slip, “Monkey King.. I'm… I'm so… so sorry!” Xiaotian cried, his voice shaking. “It's okay bud, that doesn't matter.. not anymore.” Xiaotian could hear the clinking of the stones Xiaotian could hear the clinking of the stones falling to the ground. He reached for them, grabbing one with success from the help of Wukong supporting him. “Kid… I...” Wukong sighed, being lost for words.
“Kid!” They both snapped their heads up to find the voice. Xiaotian didn't react fast enough and was pulled into a tight hug by Pigsy. It felt secure and warm. The next was Mei with Tang right beside them when Sandy pulled them in a group hug. Xiaotian burst into sobs, “I'm sorry– I messed everything up, I'm so sor–”
“Hey, hey, it's okay, you're here now, you’re okay kid.” Pigsy interrupted him, comforting him. “You did nothing wrong.” He could still hear the crackings in the sky. He looked over to the pillar, “Maybe, I can still.. I can still fix this.. If I just..”
“MK, just.. just hold my hand.” Mei held out her hand, tears still sliding down her cheeks. Xiaotian did it without hesitation. they both wanted comfort. Together, it was possible. Mei looked over at Tang and grabbed his hand. He looked scared. “So this is… this is it? We’re really all going to…” Pigsy grabbed his hand, “Tang, it’s okay.. It's okay…” He said it quietly but it was loud and clear. It was a reminder that Xiaotian’s family is here, right in front of the cracking pillar. Pigsy offered a hand to Sandy who took it gladly. Xiaotian looked over to Wukong before grabbing his hand, which surprised Wukong. He wiped away a stray tear, “We have one more..” He whispered to Xiaotian and it took him a second to realize, he nodded a grin on his face.
Wukong looked at Macaque who was surprised to see Wukong offering a hand. “We’re missing you,” Wukong said to him with a soft smile on his face. Macaque looked unsure but decided to reach out in the end. Unfortunately, that moment was ruined by the laughter and the sudden appearance of the Nine-Headed Demon, “Finally, the end of the cycle!” He said with such joy in his voice. “Now you stand to meet it.” He grinned like a mad man.
“What’s... What’s happening to you?” Macaque asked, the serpent demon looked like he was cracking, like he was made of the pillar. Said demon looked over to Macaque, “The chaos is bleeding into the world, I told you this.” He chuckled. “No matter what methods I need to use, I’m going back to where I belong.”
Xiaotian squeezed the hands he was holding before letting go. He felt rage. “No.. I won’t accept this.” He said, the anger in his voice was clear. He grabbed the staff and slammed it on the ground. The stones shattered.
If.. if I could just go back! If I could've stopped this all from happening, stopped the Nine-Headed demon, fixed the past…!
The stone’s shards glowed to life, responding to Xiaotian. beam of lights intertwined with each other, and only one didn’t, which ended up hitting Xiaotian, engulfing him in a golden light. The others had scattered when it separated from the golden light, Wukong was hit as he was in the way of where the intertwined blue and green lights were heading. The other red and silver intertwined lights went off to god knows where.
Xiaotian could hear the screams of panic, it became more and more muffled as seconds went on, his vision was blurred. He felt like he was falling. He could see a blur of Wukong’s figure. Another blurred figure, he could make out hair that looked like it was made of fire. He could hear more screams, this time more confused and panicked. And then, nothing. Just ringing in his ears.
He opens his eyes to the sound of a beeping alarm clock. He jolted up, accidentally falling off his bed. The beeping was coming from his phone. Twenty minutes before his shift. He turned off his alarm clock before looking around the room. His room.
Was it all a dream?
Xiaotian wondered, could he still turn into a demon monkey? He tried to feel that surge, to find it. He felt himself glitch into it, he gasped in surprise. He saw his dark brown fur and his tail. He blinked slowly.
“Oh my sage! It wasn't a dream!” Xiaotian said aloud without thinking, oh, so that meant… are all of my friends gone? Was it all my fault? What have I done? Why am I back in my room? What's going on? What happened?
Xiaotian was overwhelmed with every thought that came and repeated over and over again. Time blurred, he might be late for work.
(Work.. he had forgotten he used to be normal once, even human once.)
His short moment of spiraling ended with ringing, he looked around, wondering where that noise was coming from. His phone! Someone was calling him. This number. He knew it, He knew this number!
Red Son.
He picked up the phone as quickly as he could. The voice he heard was panicked but Xiaotian was never so relieved to hear a familiar voice.
“Newdle boy! What did you do?!” Red Son yelled over the phone. “I don't know! I think we're in the past? Maybe? I don't know! I'm just as confused as you are!” Xiaotian shouted. He could hear Red Son take a deep shaky breath, “Okay, okay...” A pause but he could still hear the shaky breaths Red Son was taking over the phone.
“That does not make it any better!” Xiaotian had to pull the phone away from his ear because of how loud Red Son screeched in through the phone. “I'm sorry! I really don't know what happened! I think it was- wait.. oh... Oh!”
Was it when he…?
“‘Oh’ what!? I need more than a ‘oh’ Newdle boy!” Xiaotian tried to find a way to explain this, but he decided to just rip off the bandaid. “So.. you remember the cracking in the sky and all, like what happened with Azure and all.”
“Uh.. yeah, Dragon girl told me you were trying to find the color stones to fix the Pillar of Heaven.”
“Okay, cool, um.. So there was only supposed to be five, and we assumed that was all that was needed but um..” Xiaotian wondered if he should tell Red Son.
Oh whatever, he’s not going to overreact or anything!
“The pillar also needed a sacrifice, meaning the Harbinger of Chaos.. So–”
“So you failed to find this Harbinger?” Red Son sighed, a bit disappointed. “No.. not really..” Xiaotian said sheepishly. Why was he so nervous to tell him? “What do you mean?” Red Son demanded, Xiaotian wondered if Red Son was glaring at his phone right now. If he is, Xiaotian is both scared and impressed by how strong it was that even Xiaotian could feel it all the way from here.
“The Harbinger of Chaos.. Was me..” Xiaotian waited patiently for a response.
“What.”
“WHAT!?”
Xiaotian winced, pulling the phone away from his ears to not damage his eardrums from the loud, panicked cry. “Wait! Wait.. just hear me out, okay?” He could hear Red Son take another deep breath. “Don’t know what else there is to explain, but... just go on.” Was it just Xiaotian, or did Red Son actually sound concerned?
“Okay, so what happened was, Monkey King tried to sacrifice himself instead because we were made from the same stone.” Xiaotian could hear a faint, “What?”
“But I used the circlet on him, which I really regret, and I had a conversation with Nuwa, she said the cycle couldn’t continue. I didn’t want it to. So I kind of escaped with the stone so I’m alive! But… I couldn’t stand to think there wasn’t another way.. And.. I think the stones responded to my will...?”
“What do you mean by your will?” Red Son asked, “When I slammed my staff to the ground, the stones glowed and hit me with this beam of light after I thought about wanting to go back.”
“Go back?”
“Fix things I guess, I think it hit Monkey King as well.” Xiaotian nervously waited for an answer but all he heard was a sigh, “I guess that explains the beam of light that hit me too.”
“Wait what?”
“Yeah, a beam of red and white light, I’m guessing those beams of light were the thing that transported us to the past, so if it hit us two, and it hit that monkey, I’m guessing that he’s back with us.”
“How did you figure that out?” Xiaotian asked, “Ugh, do I have to explain everything to you? We were hit with beams of light, and like you mentioned, it hit the monkey as well, so if we go off our situation, he’ll probably be back in time as well.”
“Oh.”
“Yeah, oh.” Red Son sighed, “So what do we do now?” Xiaotian could hear shuffling and pages flipping. “Okay, this is a week before I finish the gauntlet, we still have time to figure stuff out..”
“Red Son?”
“Hm?”
“What about your father?” A pause, “I forgot about that…” He could hear Red Son wince, “I could take the staff out!”
“No! You idiot! Father will question you if he sees you, besides, you know what he'll do if he gets out! Why would you do that?!” Xiaotian was surprised at the question. “Why wouldn't I? He's your dad. You'll be sad because you care about him.” Xiaotian said as if it was as simple as that. He could hear another exasperated sigh coming from Red Son. “If we're going to do that, we need a plan.”
“Ooh! What do you have in mind?”
A pause, then the sound of pen meeting paper was heard for a few seconds.
“Okay, so. Let's meet up on the spot in two days, at night, my mother probably won’t check on me until three in the morning to make sure I’m asleep, but she does check on me between ten P.M. and twelve in the morning…”
A pause with the sound of pen scribbling on paper again.
“We can meet up at one in the morning. I know there’s a small hidden place that we can hide, there is also an exit so we can escape easily without catching my father’s attention. Does that sound good?” Xiaotian nodded along, “Yeah, okay.”
“All right. Oh shoot, I should get going before my mother notices I’m not making something.” Red Son said, “Oh! Okay! Bye!” Xiaotian said, hanging up the phone. He felt like he was forgetting something.
“Oh shoot! Work!” Xiaotian ran out before going back in to change out of his pj’s and into proper clothes. He ran out of his apartment and ran down the stairs to go into the shop, Tang looked over at the sound. Mei hasn’t noticed Xiaotian yet as she was still scrolling through her phone for puppy videos. Pigsy was grumbling about something as he was making noodles.
“Pigsy..?” Xiaotian said nervously. Pigsy turned around menacingly with a tight smile on his face, a wooden spoon in hand. “Where. Were. YOU!? DO YOU KNOW HOW MANY CUSTOMERS WE LET DOWN!? HONESTLY–” Pigsy went on a ramble but Xiaotian didn’t care. This was his family, this was home.
Xiaotian was glad to be home again