Tales of Symphonia - Hope
Title: Hope
Author: sam_sam_samedi
Pairing: Kratos/spoiler!Anna
Prompt: "I would liken you to a night without stars were it not for your eyes." (Quiet Girl, Langston Hughes)
Rating: PG-13.
Warning: A little vague; Kratos being his usual apathetic self. Somewhat tragic and condescending in regards to the nature of the piece. Also, edited, finally.
The stars blazed against midnight black as the campfire cackled. Shadows curled in the underbrush and wind hissed through Sylvarant's valleys-low hills that were carved by the Summon Spirits when the Great War raged through the very fabric of the world.
His hands rested in his lap while he watched the flames dance, his eyes flickering red-gold. 'The Great War,' he thought, reminded of the past. Kratos Aurion knew the earth as a friend; the trees were ancient, and the wind, fire, and rain old even in a world where he had lived four-thousand years. Being an onlooker was his only calling-he had seen men die in wars, the world fall to this thing called Sylvarant and Tethe'alla, and a 'hero' fall from grace. He knew of time and apathy and humanity's hopeless, meaningless existence. He knew four thousand years of failure.
There was a brief silence, and Lloyd's footsteps were loud in his world when he slipped into the clearing, and her words rang in the pit of his skull. There was an odd reminder in his idealism, and the way he claimed that they could save a Chosen who was already lying in her coffin. He could see Anna, with brown eyes and a hard, practical edge to her voice while tears streaked ashy cheeks, somewhere in him:
"The future will not frighten me. If my boy-and he's a boy, I know!-is born in a ditch, a human ranch, or a mansion, then he is still my boy. They can come, they can kill me, but I will die protecting my son. Perhaps fighting a friend is hard, but I came here with you, and I'll end it with you. . . We'll protect him!"
'These things make a mockery of human life,' but it was not so. Her meaning was in keeping her son alive even long after she died, but Kratos had forgotten how it felt to put faith in the goodness of humanity. He had condemned his loves to Mother Martel and her lies, with Mithos as his last attachment to whatever life he lived. He knew that his world was a starless thing without his Anna; his sleep dreamless when she was not there to haunt him. Hope was gone, and there was only the Chosen's death and Martel's revival.
'What son could I possibly protect now,' and that, he thought, was perhaps his greatest sin in life.
Author: sam_sam_samedi
Pairing: Kratos/spoiler!Anna
Prompt: "I would liken you to a night without stars were it not for your eyes." (Quiet Girl, Langston Hughes)
Rating: PG-13.
Warning: A little vague; Kratos being his usual apathetic self. Somewhat tragic and condescending in regards to the nature of the piece. Also, edited, finally.
The stars blazed against midnight black as the campfire cackled. Shadows curled in the underbrush and wind hissed through Sylvarant's valleys-low hills that were carved by the Summon Spirits when the Great War raged through the very fabric of the world.
His hands rested in his lap while he watched the flames dance, his eyes flickering red-gold. 'The Great War,' he thought, reminded of the past. Kratos Aurion knew the earth as a friend; the trees were ancient, and the wind, fire, and rain old even in a world where he had lived four-thousand years. Being an onlooker was his only calling-he had seen men die in wars, the world fall to this thing called Sylvarant and Tethe'alla, and a 'hero' fall from grace. He knew of time and apathy and humanity's hopeless, meaningless existence. He knew four thousand years of failure.
There was a brief silence, and Lloyd's footsteps were loud in his world when he slipped into the clearing, and her words rang in the pit of his skull. There was an odd reminder in his idealism, and the way he claimed that they could save a Chosen who was already lying in her coffin. He could see Anna, with brown eyes and a hard, practical edge to her voice while tears streaked ashy cheeks, somewhere in him:
"The future will not frighten me. If my boy-and he's a boy, I know!-is born in a ditch, a human ranch, or a mansion, then he is still my boy. They can come, they can kill me, but I will die protecting my son. Perhaps fighting a friend is hard, but I came here with you, and I'll end it with you. . . We'll protect him!"
'These things make a mockery of human life,' but it was not so. Her meaning was in keeping her son alive even long after she died, but Kratos had forgotten how it felt to put faith in the goodness of humanity. He had condemned his loves to Mother Martel and her lies, with Mithos as his last attachment to whatever life he lived. He knew that his world was a starless thing without his Anna; his sleep dreamless when she was not there to haunt him. Hope was gone, and there was only the Chosen's death and Martel's revival.
'What son could I possibly protect now,' and that, he thought, was perhaps his greatest sin in life.