Disclaimer: I do not own Suikoden II, or any aspect of the story, characters or settings. I'm just another fan.
Respite
This had taken place for hours, nay almost days, and yet neither of them would dare give up for everything did hang up on the final issue of this confrontation. All of it, their minds, theirs wits, their spirits, their brawn, their skills and even their soul were poured endlessly, seamlessly, in the balance with the dim hope of weighting it down toward their side. What was this all about, you ask? Glory, maybe. Power, surely. Revenge, obviously. However, above it all, this was about good and evil, order and chaos, peace and war, yin and yang, supremacy and freedom. There was, indeed, as both their blades clashed eerily before the rising sun, more to this then a mere battle. Yes, this was truly an epic clash beyond the comprehension, the very spiritual clairvoyance, of both men. Their fight had brought to them nothing but strife and pain as their exhausted body once again rose up from the ground on which it would have wished nothing but to rest on to trade blows once again. They were dirty, bloody, smelly, right down nasty. Both of them, to speak honestly, were obviously putting their very life on the line.
The duellists kept on, for lack of a more proper term, smacking, slicing and stabbing the living daylight out of each other while the few fires left from their night of battling slowly died out. The lengthier the fight got the more it became ludicrously obvious how both their exhaustion had reached untold summits. Yet, after a vicious blow that landed on the side of the much taller and broader warrior, the smaller, younger, hero spoke up.
"Tell me, Luca, why are you doing this? You never told any of us your reasons. So tell me, is there reason behind the madness, is there a purpose beyond mere carnage?" the lightly armoured true rune bearer asked of his nemesis with a tired but, surprisingly, curious tone of voice, almost as if he enjoyed the fight.
"Fool. Reason you ask? Of course there is reason! However how could you, you dirty pig, understand? No, you merely can't. My pain, my strife, my ideal, they are beyond the grasp of such a pathetic, miserable, peasant such as yourself. You should be glad I even waste time dealing with the likes of you!" Luca yell the last part with an arrogant, almost ghastly, gleam in his eye.
"Then why won't you tell me Luca? Are you…afraid? Afraid that someone might understand, someone might beat you at your own game, someone might actually prove to you how pathetically childish you are?" the shield told his enemy calmly, with cold contempt.
Of course Luca Blight did the only thing a man such as himself could, and would, do in such a situation; he uttered a loud, almost beastly, laugh, a wolf grin plastered over his crude yet majestic features.
"Fine, I'll tell you. These pigs, bandits hired by these very ants you try to defend, raped and then murdered dear mother while my coward, miserable cockroach, of a father fled the scene of the attack. Of course this is not my full reason, but if you want to know why I begun to do this then you must understand how politics work. I hate my father and this kingdom. It was simple mathematics from there, really. Murder the Coward, then take his throne as his only heir, and last but not least take my revenge on this filthy, depraved, land you dare give so much glory as to even call it a home. Really, it was the only logical thing to do, to…deal with all this." Luca speak his whole life story with a cold, detached, expression, his voice even showing a hint of what you could call weakness but we will call humanity at the last few words.
A long, uneasy, silence ensued as both combatants sank deep into thought; one to regain his composure and the other to make sense out of all this.
"L…Luca…" he, the shield, spoke up slowly, unsure of himself and confused for the second time.
"See, filthy pig? You too are speechless. None of your miserable words could even come close to understanding the nature of my plan. There shall be neither glory nor shame in your death; that much I will give you for daring to ask." Luca told his foe with calm disgust as he lifted the tool of sorrow he dubbed a blade, his blade, and readied himself for the last assault.
"No… you're wrong! You are! I won't let you win, Luca! I….I won't…. I won't let you!" the boy spoke the last few words with a shaky confidence.
"Then go ahead, try and strike. Strike strongly your mightiest strike for this shall be your last!" The noble beast roared stepping back a few pace and then boldly charging his opponent.
The both of them parried and stroke with perfect precision and timing creating an almost hypnotic effect around them as some sort of harmony of death came to be over their duel.
"Every single good thing as an end, that is a fact, so why won't you just die already you filthy pig!" the elder child of the Blight family yelled with one mighty and final swing of his lethal weapon. A swing of such force, such magnitude, that even the True Beast Rune itself would have been awed by it - one of such incredible potent that it sliced the air in two separate waves and made a small cloud of the dust on the ground.
On his side, the shield brought up his sword to deal his own lethal blow. This was the crucial moment were fate would decide which path would the world walk upon.
Then, an immense clash that brought upon the innocent forest such a mighty thundering noise of bending steel that it's entire population awoke in panic and fright. Only mere moments after this a river of blood flew out of the deformed mass of shadows that were now both opponents in front of the rising sun. The new era had been chosen and brought upon an unwary land; let us pray it was a wise choice on the part of fate.
The taller of them both crumbled to his knees, a vague look in his now unfocused eyes. His lips trembled, almost as if he was trying to utter some matter of speech but it now escaped him in this dire hour. How could this be he wondered, why, by all logic he should have made short work of this miserable, despicable, worm. Yet nothing in his cold, confused, mind could bring to him a satisfying answer as his last forces escaped him and he crumbled to the ground, the blood guzzling out of his torn chest.
The smaller warrior knelt and took the vile villain, if one is to make such easy assumptions, head in his hands. This is when a familiar figure came out of the woods with a few soldiers behind him.
"Lord Riou, we were betrayed. We have to escape now, so please hurry. I'll follow you soon after." he of clear mind and sharp wit instructed to his superior.
"But…Shu… I… I…" Riou stuttered uneasily.
"We do not have time for this, Lord Riou! Hurry now, we cannot afford to lose you after losing so many soldiers in this trap! I beg of you, make haste." Shu demand of his superior humbly.
"B…fine." Riou says with a deep, heart wrenching, sigh as he gets up and run, along with the guards, toward safety while the captain of his personal guards explain to him the details of a certain someone unforeseen betrayal.
Shu made sure every single of them were beyond earshot before walking next to Luca's agonizing figure so he could look down on him silently.
The now dethroned King of Highland coughed up some blood as his eyes wandered onto Shu's face, however to him it was already but a mere blur of color in the many shadows created by the bright rise of the solar star.
"What…what…do…cough…do you want?" Luca ask with a weak voice, putting his last forces in these few pathetic words.
"Tell me, Luca, in all these years were you have schemed, betrayed, and murdered by the thousands for your own selfish ends, not even giving relative safety from your vile means to your own family, did you ever do something that made you happier?" Shu asked with his cool voice which reminded Luca of a quiet, refreshing, summer breeze. The strategist then knelt and puts his icy hand on Blight's scorching forehead.
"Bring these words in your tomb, Luca, for these are the only ones that will bring any light in your heart in the eternity of death." Shu began with a confident assurance about him that reminded Luca of someone but he simply could not bring himself to remember exactly who anymore.
"There is no more redemption left for you, Luca, only respite or damnation. I offer you respite, either take it or leave it." Shu swiftly finished as he got up, and left the man that had terrorized countless to his last sleep.
Done anything that made me happier… Luca repeated without end in his dying spirit, the inescapable cloak of death blinding his mind ever so slowly.
Damn, did I? were the last few words that echoed in Luca's mind as he shifted roads to walk on the path known as eternity among a few.
"You will find respite in death only once you can see and accept the shortcomings of your life. That is true respite for the soul; anything else is only delusion that will bring nothing but damnation. Salvation is respite. Truly, you are, in death if nothing else, a lucky man son of Agares." The Lady of Fate spoke to some strange, unknown, force that only she could ever dream to see, let alone comprehend.
Leknaat brought her hand to her crystal and on this physical command it clouded and shrouded until it became but infinite void and darkness. No matter who or why they were, she would follow them for they were and are the ones that mattered and matter the most.
They were and are the Stars of Destiny, even in their last respite.
- The End -