Reach For the Stars, Milo!
A/N: Okay, Shion's body is no longer in plain view...let's just say that Saga hid it a little better, okay? Otherwise this entire thing is even more illogical than it already is.
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Milo was five years old when he first climbed Star Hill.
It was a hard climb-his hands were bleeding and he was sweating like a pig, because on a hot summer's day the last thing most people want to do is strenuous exercise, but Milo had been planning this for weeks.
His was a simple plan: it's nearly the middle of summer, wait until everyone has gone to the beach and then race back to Sanctuary and see just what's so special about Star Hill. And his plan was so secret that he hadn't even told Camus (who in his heart of hearts he knew would have sighed, shook his head and helped him climb the thing, but Milo wanted to do this by himself.)
So when all the other Gold Saints and future Gold Saints and various other chromatic warriors were splashing away down on the beach (under the eye of a harassed-looking Saga) Milo had hid Camus' bucket and spade to distract him, put a crab down Aphrodite's shorts to distract everyone else and then raced back to Sanctuary as far as his saintly little legs would carry him.
There he had stripped out of his swimming trunks, put on a pair of good sturdy boots and began the arduous climb up Star Hill. At first it was easy-a worn little path had been made by other apprentices who had tried-and failed-to get to the top. But Milo knew he was better than them. Where they failed, the future Gold Saint of Scorpio would succeed!
Soon enough, the path wore out and the ancient rocks began to crumble as he clutched at them. The weeds and shrubs he grasped at were little better-and once or twice he lost his footing entirely and fell tumbling back to the path. But he didn't give up. What would be the point in that? And so Milo climbed up and up and up, until his knees were scraped and his hands were bleeding and full of gravel and there were no more shrubs to cling on to. He climbed as the air grew thinner and the wind became colder, and his cheeks became chapped and red.
The Pope is an old man-how does he do this?
Up he climbed and just as the sun had began to sink into the horizon Milo pulled himself up onto the very top of the summit of Star Hill, using the last ounce of his strength and determination in his little body. And for the first time he sat quietly and appreciated a sunset, because he was too tired to do anything else. He saw the sun burning like a tiger's eye in the sky, and streaks of pink tearing across the clouds-and in the very distance he saw a little stream of people, all of them glowing faintly, making their way back to Sanctuary from the beach.
He supposed they'd looked for him, and he knew Saga would get blamed for his absence (him being the oldest Gold Saint and all) but he didn't really care. This was a little more important than papal promotions or safety in numbers.
Eventually, the sun set, the glowing children returned to their temples and barracks and the stars finally, finally came out! Down on the boring ground Milo had heard much about them-he knew about Ganymede the water-carrier and Bacchus the apparent goat-fish, as well as the centaur Chiron and the despairing Astraea. Most of all he knew about the bright red star Antares and the little scorpion that defeated the mighty Orion. Milo was not a boaster, but he was proud of his constellation.
Down on the ground, the stars and their stories (even when explained by Pope Shion) seemed very far away-even further away than their Goddess Athena. And how can something so far away guide your destiny? Milo wanted to believe...he just didn't quite manage.
So he went to the place closest to the stars-Star Hill, and all he wanted was a sense of kinship with the sign of his future armour-but as the stars blinked into vision he felt nothing. Up above him Aquila, Ophiuchus, Libra and Hydra twinkled happily, unaware that they were being dissed by a five-year-old, and Virgo seemed as far away and as cold as Shaka was.
Big blue eyes widened as Milo took in the closest view he had ever had of Scorpio, one of the brightest constellations in the night sky. Suddenly the stars were big and shiny and there...but he couldn't understand them. If they were trying to tell him something with their twinkling, he figured he was too young to understand what it was. It really was a job for the Pope, trying to decipher some comprehensible message from the pretty shiny things in the sky.
The first time Milo climbed Star Hill, he wasn't discouraged by the stars and he managed to sneak back into Scorpio Temple without anyone noticing he had gone. Camus gave him hell in the morning, but hell, he had climbed Star Hill!
However, the second time Milo climbed Star Hill he was seven years old and had just won the Gold Cloth of Scorpio. His master wasn't even cold in the ground and Milo was already up and racing around, desperate to see if now that he was a Gold Saint (in the service of Athena for evermore!) the stars would let him understand them.
The climb was easier-this time, he was stronger and there was no duplicity involving a bucket and spade this time either. But once again, Gold Saint Scorpio Milo reached the summit of Star Hill, sat in a place only Popes had sat, and the stars made him feel like a little child.
Which, in fact, he was.
"I thought I'd find you here, Scorpio Milo."
The elderly voice of Pope Shion did well to remind Milo of this fact, and he spun around like a kid with his hand in a holy cookie jar.
"Aargh! Pope Shion! I could've sworn it would've taken you all evening to deal with the frogs in your bathroom!"
The old Pope grinned. "Thought that was you, too. And I let Saga clean them up; I'm too old to be running about catching amphibians!"
Milo grimaced, and decided to stay out of Saga's way for at least a month. Pope Shion grinned again and picked up his papal robes, settling down onto the ground besides Milo.
"She's beautiful, isn't she?"
"Who is, sir?" Milo had never been quite this close to the Pope before, and unsurprisingly he smelt of Mu and old people. Once again, Pope Shion grinned and pointed to the sky.
"Your constellation, Scorpio Milo. Your destiny."
And then Milo didn't quite know what to say, because he had looked at Scorpio many times that night, and each time all he got was 'big balls of gases.'
So he said the first thing that he thought sounded suitably holy.
"Does that mean I have a beautiful destiny or a destiny with a beautiful woman?"
Pope Shion chuckled, his dots crinkling into the furrows of his forehead. "I can't tell you that, Scorpio Milo-your destiny can only truly be read by you! All I can do is provide a generalized picture."
....Great. How was Milo supposed to know his destiny if the stupid stars wouldn't even let him know what it was in the first place? He spent the rest of the night cold and sulky, refusing even to acknowledge the fact that it was a miracle that Pope Shion hadn't hurled him off Star Hill for defacing sacred ground. Once again, Star Hill had been a failure.
The third time Milo went up Star Hill, he brought Camus (by now Aquarius Camus, which the nine-year-old said often and with pride) along for the ride.
Milo scrambled up the mountain like a purple-haired monkey and Camus, distinctly out of his comfort zone and not too happy about breaking The Rules, scowled along behind him. Milo hoped he'd be cheerful enough to make a giant ice slide on the way back down...
They reached the top in prepubescent-boy style, with some minor cursing, a lot of tripping and plenty of dark looks from Camus. And as the stars appeared high in the autumn sky, Milo was pleased that he'd decided to bring a friend to share in his loathing of the incomprehensibility of the twinklies.
But a quick glance at Camus showed that the green-haired boy's face actually bore a smile, and it was one of-oh dear-wonder, comprehension and awe. All directed at the constellation of Aquarius.
Stupid stars. Milo supposed Camus could read his entire life's story in those nasty shiny things, and that it was telling him wonderful, happy things about a life full of love and ice and devotion to Athena. A look at Camus' faintly beaming face confirmed this.
"So? What do they tell you?" He figured it was best to get the smugness over and done with, but Camus looked a little confused for a moment.
"Tell? My stars are telling me nothing, Milo-it's more of a feeling. A really good feeling. Well, it's sort of like taking medicine-the feeling feels bad at first and then it gets wonderful, like I've done something really worthwhile with my life..."
Stupid Camus. Stupid stars. Milo supposed that down on the ground Shura and Aphrodite were doing exactly the same as Camus, getting warm fuzzy feelings from their destinies, whereas he, Milo, would once again be left sulking in the dark.
The fourth time Milo climbed Star Hill, he'd given up on wanting to know his destiny because, quite frankly, he was happy trying to muddle things up. He'd resigned himself to the fact that he was never going to be a master stargazer (ever) and after Aiolos' betrayal soon after the Star Hill expedition with Camus; Milo had decided that it was stupid to believe that his destiny was set in stone, not when it was intertwined with so many others.
He hadn't even planned the trip-in fact, the fourteen-year-old had just felt like a walk and soon enough he was scrambling up the side of a mountain. The path seemed much more defined this time-it was clear he and Camus hadn't been the only Saints trekking up the holy hill.
Grabbing a clump of weed and hoisting himself up onto the summit, Milo supposed he'd find Deathmask's graffiti or a lonely-looking Shura. Instead (and much to his surprise) he found...
"Shaka? Are you breaking rules?"
The Virgo saint looked haughty. "Hardly. The Pope just left, we've been here for hours."
Milo smirked slightly."Hours, eh? And you were stargazing all that time? Sounds to me like you've released your inner blonde..."
Shaka had a look of confusion and vague distaste on his pretty face. "I'm sure I don't know what you mean. An inner what?"
"An inner blonde. We all have them-I have one, Camus has one, Aphrodite has his in plain view-you have lots of inner blonde because you are blonde, but you squash it down tight and try not to let your blonde instincts take over when in the presence of others."
"I am positive I don't know what you mean." If Shaka had his eyes open, Milo knew he would be glaring. But Shaka never conveyed that much emotion, and as such Milo was left with no other option than to sit down far too close to him and ask him what he saw in the stars.
Shaka looked at him with his eyelids for a minute before deciding Milo actually wanted an answer and that it wasn't another crude pun.
"Well...I don't see anything. But I feel a great many things. The stars have cosmoses, much bigger than ours, and I can feel those. Currently, they're unhappy about something, I don't know what-Virgo is particularly out of sorts, she's the sign of justice and she's telling me that justice has not been served."
Milo frowned. Aiolos was dead, wasn't he? Then a question struck him.
"Hey, do you follow the stars or Buddha? Or do you try for a nice even mix of both, because that must be seriously confusing..."
Shaka frowned. "The stars give us our destiny, Buddha shows me how to live my day-to-day life-with respect to all living things, Milo, and that includes you-so I will give you three seconds to get off my cloak before I relieve you of your five senses!"
Milo got off the cloak sharpish. "Oops, sorry, thought it was available! Anyway, are you saying that the stars don't guide us, they just complain to us when stuff is wrong?"
"Maybe. I'm not the Pope; I can't read the stars fluently yet. All I know is what Virgo tells me and what Buddha tells me, and they tell me that we are as small as the unnamed stars in the sky. What we do is all part of a much larger picture, and this picture will carry on until the end of time. "
"Hmm...What would you say to someone who didn't get these warm fuzzy feelings from his constellation? Would you lend him your cloak?"
"No. And the feelings aren't warm and fuzzy. I would say...that it didn't matter much, because even if he doesn't know his destiny, Scorpio does."
"Uwaah! I never said it was me! I'm asking for Camus!
"Of course you are."
Milo and Shaka bickered long into the night (and in the end, Milo did get the cloak).
Afterwards, Milo felt that his most successful trip to Star Hill had been his first and that all subsequent ones confirmed what he already knew-that he couldn't understand his own star sign-but in the end, he decided not to ponder over it. He was young, powerful and devilishly handsome (if he said so himself) and surely at twenty there was more to life than stars?
And he held this view until, after five long years of fighting and so many Saints dead and resurrected and then dead again and resurrected again, Athena herself took him by the hand and led him to a small staircase in the side of Star Hill and led him up to the summit.
(He wished he'd known about that when he was five years old!)
There Athena continued to hold his hand until he confessed that it might make Camus jealous, and she smiled and let go. She could feel his cosmos regardless.
Athena smiled at Milo, and once again he forgot that she was a young girl and not an ageless beauty of a goddess. "Milo, you've always wanted to see your destiny, haven't you?"
She smiled at him like a kindly mother and a little sister and a wise teacher all at once. And Milo was on the verge of reaching out and yelling 'yes, yes, show me my stars!'...until he realised something. He, Gold Saint Milo of Scorpio had defeated Titans, trounced a false Pope, been to hell and back, helped defeat Hades and even helped overcome Zeus. What more could his destiny possibly have in store for him?
So he simply smiled. "No thanks Athena, I don't need it. I can feel enough cosmoses in Sanctuary already!"
She simply smiled back. "Tough, Scorpio wants to talk to you."
And with that (and a rather large amount of Athena's divine cosmos), the barrier that had been separating Milo and his stars was burst open, and a flood of feelings rushed in.
Milo shrieked and clutched his head. "No! NO! BAD STARS! BAD SHAULA! BAD ANTARES!"
Yes, the flood of feelings that Scorpio wished to express were not benevolent like Aquarius or wronged like Virgo, but merely annoyed and sadistic. Milo stumbled around the summit of Star Hill like a man possessed, clutching at his ears and yelling like an aggrieved bear.
Behind him, Aquarius Camus smirked. Athena smirked back.
"What are the stars telling him, Athena?"
"I believe the direct translation from thoughts to words is 'clean your temple, you dirty bastard."
"Ah. Thought so."
"We have been telling him that for a while..."
"It's only fair that he treat the stars with respect..."
In front of them, Milo gave a singularly high-pitched wail and with a final shriek of "comb your hair!" the constellation of Scorpio pitched their Saint off of the top of Star Hill.
Athena and Camus looked down.
"Ouch. That has to hurt."
"Do you think that's a broken head or a broken leg?"
"Ah, he'll recover! Milo always was one to bounce back!"
A few days later, resting in his temple with with a broken hip, femur and collarbone and a nasty cup of herbal tea, Milo vowed never to visit Star Hill again. Some things just weren't worth it!
A Milo oneshot, with cameos from Camus, Shion, Athena and Shaka. Apologies if my astrology was incorrect (it probably was) and if the characters were OOC (they probably were). It's my first time writing for Saint Seiya, and I respect the canon a lot-but that doesn't mean I can follow it (or remember it!)
Done because Milo never seemed one to follow a set path, and because I always wondered what was so special about Star Hill anyway. (Also, wouldn't he be the cutest child?) Shaula and Antares are stars in the Scorpius constellation.
The Saga/Shaka interaction is canonical to Episode G. It's quite funny how much time those two spend together in that.
No offence to any blondes out there (I myself am blonde as you can probably tell!)
Contains very slight shonen-ai. I surprised myself-no underage boys lost their virginity in this.
-The Love Bug
