Meanwhile, in another world, the Sheriff poked at the fire, trying to eke out an extra scrap or two of warmth from it. Recently, despite living in the scorching heat of the mesa, he’d been feeling so cold, and he didn’t know why. To make matters worse, some traitorous part of his mind was yearning, a deep pining that nothing could sate for a man he’d never met, never known, never seen.
In the distance, an enderman vwooped, and a surge of primal terror ran through Jimmy, the electric fear of being moments from death dancing in his heart. He gripped his arms tighter, forcing the feeling down. He was the sheriff. He was the law. The law was not afraid of endermen.
…But Jimmy was. He scooched closer to the fire, trying to ignore the strange familiarity in its dancing shapes.
“Hey sheriff!” A voice out of nowhere startled Jimmy, and he yelped, practically leaping over the fire. The hemline of his vest caught, and he spent a moment putting it out, wincing at the burning on the heel of his palm. (In another universe, a certain monarch’s hand itched slightly. He put some ice on it. It wasn’t like he was running low on the stuff.)
Jimmy looked up, finally, meeting the gaze of the person who had so rudely come up behind him. It was that new emperor, what’s-her-name. False? False. Yeah, that sounded right. False being true. Damn that oxymoron.
“Hey, uh, False?” Jimmy greeted awkwardly. False chuckled, and sat down opposite him.
“Yeah, False.” She nodded, smiling. “You’re… the Sheriff, right?”
“Uh, yeah,” Jimmy confirmed, “But most people call me Jimmy.”
“Well. Nice to meet you Jimmy.”
“Nice to meet you. Sorry about the awkward welcome.”
“No, no, it’s fine!” False shook her head, laughing.
“Well, uh, what brings you here?” Jimmy asked, finally regaining his composure enough to sit up properly.
“Well, I was just checking up, really. You seemed upset about something at the meeting.”
“Oh, that? No, I just…” Jimmy sighed. “Do you ever feel like you’re forgetting something really important?”
“I guess, yeah?” False shrugged. “Like… there’s something or someone that needs stopping, someone who needs protecting…”
“Someone you’re letting down. Someone you got killed. Someone you miss.”
“And it’s… it’s so cold.”
“And you can’t do anything to help because you don’t know who you’re helping.”
Jimmy and False looked at each other in surprise.
“I thought I was the only one.” Jimmy gasped.
“I think everyone has something like that.” False shrugged. “Something about this world, you can’t remember anything outside of it.”
“Really? To be honest, I thought there just… wasn’t anything outside of this world.”
“No, there has to be.” False shook her head. “Because… I go somewhere else, sometimes. I leave and come back and can’t remember what happened in the interim.”
“I guess that explains the, uh, the nightmares.”
“The nightmares?”
“Yeah, the—”
“█████, please.” All of a sudden, Jimmy found himself back in the throne room that kept appearing in his dreams, locked in a body he had no control over. “This is getting ridiculous.” There was someone in front of him, holding out a withered, dead potato plant as they spoke. They looked… weirdly like Gem? Interesting.
“I really don’t think it—” a voice spoke, his mouth moving outside of his control. Jimmy hated how cold it sounded, not when some deeply-buried part of his mind associated this voice with warmth and home.
“The crops are dying, █████. The mobs, too. The villagers are too cold to trade, the farms are locking up with ice… if you don’t stop this blizzard, we’ll all starve!” Not-Gem interrupted.
“Really. How interesting.”
“█████, this isn’t like you. This isn’t like either of you. You’ve never been this… this… cold, before.”
“You know what?” his voice pondered, “You’re right. I should care more about the food-ification situation. Can’t be a king of no-one, after all!”
“Exactly!”
“So.” His face twisted into a smile that wasn’t his own. “Tell you what. Whoever can build a farm that can withstand the cold—because don’t get me wrong, this winter isn’t gonna end for a long time—will get a… reward.” A sick glee that was not his own, and probably didn’t belong to whoever owned the eyes he was seeing through either, twisted in his chest. He probably didn’t want to know what that reward was.
“Jimmy?”
Jimmy was suddenly thrown back into reality, the unexpected, burning touch of a hand on his shoulder piercing through his consciousness. He let out a yelp as his senses rushed back to him, scuttling away from… False. His memories slowly came back too, bringing him back to the present.
“Are you alright?” False asked. “You kinda zoned out there for a second. Well,” she checked her watch, “More like fifteen minutes.”
“Fifteen what now,” Jimmy croaked.
“Yeah, I was, uh, about to call the other emperors—”
“No, don’t!” Jimmy interrupted.
“What?” False turned back to look at him, immediately concerned.
“I—I don’t know what they’d do to him!” Jimmy protested, “But what’s happening, that’s—that’s not him. He’s not in control, something else is manipulating him, twisting him, making him feel things he doesn’t feel and know things he doesn’t know and he hates it. He hates what’s happening as much as everyone else, but… I don’t think the others would—would recognise that, and they’d hurt him, and… I can’t hurt him. Not again.”
“Who?” False asked, crouching down to Jimmy’s level. He gaped for a moment, trying to recall the emotions that had just surged through him and coming up empty. He searched his memory for a name, for a face, but… nothing. It was like there was a massive wall of brick and stone and terracotta and magic in his mind and he couldn’t remember anything.
“...I don’t know,” he answered. “I don’t know!” he yelled, like the emotion would bring something forward. “I don’t… I don’t… I can’t. I can’t remember.”
False regarded him with a frown. Little did he know, but his little outburst had struck an odd chord with the things she was failing to remember, almost like… there was something out there, someone who was in trouble.
If only they could remember.