27 Chapter 24: little story

(Date and place unknown)

The planet earth, devastated by the last war that humanity provoked, perhaps influenced by supernatural powers... or just humans being humans

Most of the cities now lie in ruins, inhabited by strange pink blobs, green slimes, and ugly mutants.

all except one

A nameless city that seems separated from the others, with its sky covered in clouds that constantly produce snow that falls from the sky

All the mutants that once inhabited this city are now frozen or covered in snow.

That would be the only difference... if you ignore the huge mountain made of ice in the middle of the city

The peak of this mountain had three holes that formed an almost sad expression.

It was the ice castle

(Inside the castle)

Everything seemed empty with several desolate ice rooms

except one

In the depths of the castle, in the only dimly lit room

there was a silhouette of a man in the candlelight

It was a large room furnished with shelves full of books on all sides, along with different technological devices and cables everywhere.

A large full-length mirror was located in one of the corners of the room.

A man with leg-length white hair and beard, dressed in a faded gray suit

He was sitting at the only desk in the room in front of the candles and stacked papers muttering to himself as he wrote on the back of some photos.

They were photos of two very different little children, a white-haired boy with green eyes next to a girl with black hair and eyes.

This man was Simon Petrikov

"Dear Blanche and Marceline, if you are reading this...it means that I am no longer in this world, spiritually speaking, maybe my body full of delusions will continue to wander the world"

"After leaving to keep them safe from my powers and my progressive madness, I managed to return home to find all my research materials along with my belongings"

"I wandered for a couple of years before deciding to create a base to store all my belongings and leave a record of my last moments of sanity"

"I can feel how the voices and visions are increasing until they almost overwhelm my consciousness at times, I'm afraid I don't have time anymore"

*sigh*

"This is one last message for you, my two angels, no matter what I become.....I will always love you"

Simon put the pen aside and stared at the photo of the two children for a few moments as if he wanted to implant that image in his mind before closing the album.

He sighed in the silent room and got up from his chair to walk in front of the mirror in the corner of the room.

Looking at his reflection with disgust, his pointed nose, his bluish skin and his now white hairs

He spoke to his reflection

"I really miss them, you know?"

He moved closer to his reflection.

"But you took them away from me!"

Simon yelled at his reflection, his eyes locked on his crown, his eyes looking wet and his knees giving out crushing him to the ground.

The silence remained for a few moments.

But a strange voice resounded behind Simon, it seemed the combination of three different voices speaking in unison.

"We miss you too Simon"

This startled the unsane man who turned his head to look behind his shoulder in an instant.

""Come with us Simon, if you fall asleep everything will end, we promise""

They were three beings of ice

an ice blanche

An Ice Marceline

And an ice Betty

all talking in unison

A look of horror came over Simon's face, screaming as he crawled back, closer to the mirror.

"NO! NO! You're not real, stay away from me, I'm not going to fall for your tricks"

The ice sculptures got closer to Simon

""We are very real Simon""

Looking at the ice sculptures slowly approaching, Simon in a panic tried to raise his hands to defend himself with his ice magic.

only to look at his hands already glowing with the power of ice, connected to the sculptures in front of him.

He created those sculptures and he was controlling them

He finally understood that he was losing the last of his sanity.

Getting up from the ground, he looked around.

In the room, now silent again, only a man remained in front of a mirror with three ice sculptures behind him.

"Maybe it's time to...give up"

Simon slowly began to close his eyelids giving in to madness to finally rest....but the image of two little children remained in his mind, preventing him from giving up definitively

The problem is that it was already too late, his own consciousness no longer allowed him to control his body completely

He searched through his memory for anything to hold onto to keep him sane but all his memories were slowly fading away

He was about to give up, but one particular memory remained intact.

The last song he sang to his son

This gave him an idea, maybe the music was the key to resist!

'Come on Simon, think! A song, a song...I know!'

Simon ran to his desk, stumbling due to the loss of control of his body, and opened the previously closed album.

He continued turning page by page looking for something

"Come on, come on!...here it is!"

It was a photo of Simon and Bety holding a little baby, the first and last photo they all took together.

Something seemed to be written on the back of the photo

It was a song for his son

Simon regained some control of his body and approached Blanche's ice sculpture.

He started to sing as he felt the memories fading little by little.

"Just A Man"

(feat. EPIC Ensemble)

Simon sang in front of the sculpture of his son in a last ditch effort to keep his sanity.

-I look into your eyes and I-

-Think back to the son of mine-

-You're as old as he was when I left for war-

-Will these actions haunt my days-

-Every man I've slain?-

-Is the price I pay endless pain?-

-Close your eyes and spare yourself the view-

-How could I hurt you?-

-I'm just a man who's trying to go home-

-Even after all the years away from what I've known-

-I'm just a man who's fighting for his life-

-Deep down I would trade the world to see my son and wife-

-I'm just a man-

-But when does a comet become a meteor?-

-When does a candle become a blaze?-

-When does a man become a monster?-

-When does a ripple become a tidal wave?

-When does the reason become the blame?-

-When does a man become a monster?-

The sculptures began to sing with Simon ( )

(When does a comet become a meteor?)

(When does a candle become a blaze?)

-Forgive me-

(When does a man become a monster?)

-Forgive me-

(When does a man become a monster?)

-Forgive me-

-I'm just a man-

Simon sang with all his might... but it wasn't enough

These were the last moments of Simon Petrikov's sanity

PS: this is an episode that I had in my mind since I heard the song, I hope you like it

By the way, I opened a patreon, all the content is free, it contains few things because it's just done but in the future it will have more behind the scenes and various surveys that can influence the story if you want go look at it I already uploaded the process to make episode 24 and a survey to determine what the arc of princess bubblegum will be like donations are only optional

patreon.com/Ims420