Free the End

32 [Those Were the Days]

Skeppy smiled, Bad looked so cute humming in his little garden.

"Hey muffinhead, stop staring and actually help," Bad scolded.

He had tricked a6d into planting the potatoes, and at the minute a6d noticed a pig that had wandered against the fence and wouldn't stop staring at him.

"Hey guys?" He asked cautiously. "What is this thing doing?"

Bad looked up. "Oh it's just a piggy, don't worry. They eat potatoes and that's how you, uh, breed them. It's ok, he'll leave when you stop holding the potato."

They were growing and multiplying the crops with bone meal. Skeppy was on the wheat.

Bad paused, taking in his garden. "Hey I'm gonna go try to find some sugarcane, ok?"

Skeppy was panicked for a second. "Wait- by yourself?!"

A6d stopped what he was doing and watched.

"Yeeeeeeeees," Bad answered. "There should be some near the river where we were yesterday. It's okay, I'll be fine."

"Are you sure? All your armor is good and your shield- you have that?"

"Yeah but I don't think the sugarcane will attack me." Bad rolled his eyes.

Skeppy tried to relax and let him go.
"You don't know."

"What's a sugar cane?" a6d asked.

"A plant," Bad answered. "Skeppy, I'll be right back. It's fine. You can come with me if you really want to."

Skeppy did really want to, but he didn't want to seem clingy.
"Nah, I'll stay with a6d."

"Ok. See you guys in like a couple minutes."
Bad went through the little fence gate and left to find sugarcane.

Skeppy wondered for the first time why he wanted it. Is he making a cake? Oh wait no we need paper for books. Oh ok.

A6d ran out of bone meal so he went to put the extra potatoes in a chest and came back, putting torches on the fence.
Skeppy heard him humming or singing something lightly.

Skeppy likewise ran out of bone meal. He quieted to listen, placing tiny green seeds in the soil.

A6d was singing something different than Bad had been.
Skeppy realized with a shock that he remembered it. It was a French song a6d sang to Skeppy's stream one time... what was it called...

A6d got to the end of the second verse and sang the title again. Mistral Gagnant.
That's it.
Skeppy just listened to the gentle singing. He tried to remember what he knew about the song. He had looked it up after the stream, all that time ago.

Mistral Gagnants were an old type of candy, and they stopped making them decades ago.
The song was a sad one. It was nostalgic about how time passes.
The last verse was about sitting on a bench together and watching the sunset and celebrating good memories.

It went something like:
To sit on a bench 5 minutes alongside you,
And to watch the sun as it leaves,
To talk about the good times that are gone and I don't care,
To tell you the bad guys aren't us,
That if I am crazy it is only because of your eyes,
And they benefit from being two,
To hear your laugh rise up so high,
That away the bird's cry flies,
To tell you to love life,
Love it even if, time is a murderer
That takes away children's laughter,
And the Mistral Gagnants
And the Mistral Gagnants.

A6d finished the song with gentle slowness, and Skeppy was surprised to find tears in his eyes.

He wiped them quickly, rationalizing his emotions.
"How did you know that song?" he asked a6d quietly.