Chapter Text
John Dory stared at the Troll Tree is shocked disbelief. Pain shot through his chest, more specifically his heart. Tears rolled down his face as he stared at the empty, dead, and destroyed Troll Tree.
What the fuck hapened!? He was only gone for three fucking months! Bitty B was still only a year old when he left! Fuck!
John raced up the tree as fast as he could, racing towards his family's Pod. They should be there, all of them. His brothers, his grandmother, all of them! They just had to be there! John bursts into his family's Pod, and cried out for his brothers, sobbing with each call.
"Spruce!"
No answer.
"Clay!"
No response.
"Floyd!"
Silence.
"Branch!"
Nothing.
He got nothing in response. The pain in his heart only increases as the silence rang through his ears. Maybe if he used the nicknames he gave them...
"Shooting Star...?"
No answer.
"Firefly...?"
No response.
John's sobs only increased as he began to move deeper into their home.
"Rose Petal...?"
Silence.
Please, please just answer! Scream at me! Yell at me! Tell me how much you hate me! Just please, say something!
"Bluebell...?"
Nothing.
John looked in all of their rooms, and found no one. The entire Pod was empty save for him. Finally he came across his room, and I one last stitch effort to try and find them, he searched it as thoroughly as he could. Only to come up empty handed. John Dory fell to the floor, wrapping his arms around himself, crying and sobbing as hard as one could. He could feel it happening, his colors fading away. He felt empty. Hollow. Finally, after hours of crying, he felt nothing. He was numb.
After he ran out of tears to cry, John stood up and took a look at his now grey hands. He couldn't feel bad about being grey. He couldn't feel anything other than the pain of losing his brothers, his grandmother, everyone. As well as his own regrets, and self loathing.
It's your fault their dead.
Yes, it is.
You were supposed to protect them.
Yes, he was.
You were the oldest, you were supposed to look after them!
Yes, he was. It was his job as the oldest brother, it was his job to be responsible for them.
You weren't good enough.
No, he wasn't. They deserved better.
You weren't perfect enough.
No, he wasn't. He was never prefect enough for them. He should have been, but he wasn't.
You are a failure.
He was a failure. His brothers should have gotten the life they deserved, he should have died instead.
You need to die. You owe it to them.
Yeah, he owes them that much. Still, he feels as though he should give them a form of an apology while he still breathed. Maybe, if he wrote it down, his brothers would know just how much he regrets everything. How much he loves them.
John moved over to his old desk, grabbed four pieces of paper, and began to do the only thing he was good at. He wrote. Wrote down his regrets, his sorrow, and his love for his brothers. He wrote them each a long, and heartfelt letter. He folded them each neatly when he was finished, and wrote their names on the top. A formality, really, but it was the least he could do.
Once he was done with the letters, he lined them up to sit side by side, starting with Branch’s letter on the left, and working up to Spruce's letter on the right. All in order. Before he even thought of leaving, John reached up and pulled his Goggles off. He looked at them with a heavy heart. Spruce had gotten them for him for his eighth Hatchday. On the strap, inside, John looked at the inscription Spruce had put on it.
Follow the beat of you heart, and find your own rhythm in life.
Spruce said that if John Dory was going to be their protector, then he needed some protection of his own. That the inscription was supposed to inspire him to live life however he wanted. What John wanted though, was a life his brothers deserved. All he wanted to was to give his brothers everything they could have wanted, all they could have needed. And he couldn't even do that for them.
John Dory placed his Goggles down by Spruce's letter, before leaving his old room. Leaving his old home. Leaving the Troll Tree. Leaving the surrounding Bergan Town. All for the last time.