Word Count: 519
A/N: Day twenty nine of a writing challenge.
Summary: Lloyd finds it surprisingly easy to decide what right and wrong is; Zelos is a bit jealous.
Simple
When Lloyd reaches out his hand, uncertainty painted across his face, Zelos feels his hardened heart crack. Because Lloyd, Bud, is too trusting. He is too naive, and those traits are finally hurting him. He should never have trusted Zelos, should never have smiled and laughed with him, because Zelos is an actor at heart. A person that survives off of false pretenses, he wears mask after mask. Never showing his true face.
And Lloyd, innocent Lloyd, doesn't know how to see past such veils.
So when Zelos finally betrays them all -why does his heart hurt when he sees Lloyd's expression?- he does it with a cocky smile and a syrupy voice. For this is what Zelos is and if he doesn't act this way, if he doesn't play this betrayal just right; he could end up ruining everything for those stupid words Lloyd said.
"Aha, I don't know what to tell ya. I'm just a weak, lazy bum. All I want is a fun, easy life. That's it- nothing more, nothing less!"
Those are the words he said and nothing had ever tasted so wrong before. When he was finally out of sight, hidden away in solitude Zelos threw up. A sickness creeping up on him that he couldn't fight; his mind, body, even soul rebelled against what he said. They fought and tried to sway him, each pointing out different things. That is except for one topic, they all agreed that Lloyd, ever naive Lloyd, was someone that he wanted to be near.
He craved Lloyd's presence.
The smile that seemed to light the world, the cheerful words, the contemplative talks, everything. Zelos missed the bumpkin, and in a way, he was jealous of him. Because Lloyd found it distressingly easy to decide right and wrong (If it hurt his friends it was wrong, if it didn't then it was right. For now). Zelos didn't have that kind of reasoning he had a maze instead, a puzzle that he himself had created years ago when he first started working for Cruxis.
It was a maze that had been being made and refined for years; because Zelos couldn't stand thinking about what he was doing -deep in his heart he knew it was wrong, wrong, wrong- so he trapped that feeling and placed it in chaos. Ever lost so he wouldn't feel. He banished his conscious, and with it, his heart. Or so it seemed.
In the end though he makes his way through the puzzle he created all those years ago, he makes it out the other end with a solid thought. That he was wrong and to be right he had to help Lloyd and the others.
So he did.
He released them from their prisons, setting them free from the illusions. And as he fought side by side with Lloyd he felt an odd sensation in his chest, a sensation that he couldn't name until the fighting was done and Lloyd was souring in the sky with wings of mana and freedom.
Ah, I'm in love. With Lloyd.
Trust Lloyd to make everything complicated.