~~So I was browsing through FF dot net and realized that I didn't see "What if Lloyd was a girl.." fanfics. Apparently I was expecting to see at least a few… I mean, who doesn't want to play with the idea of Kratos having a daughter?
I know I do. And so, from my twisted mind to yours, my answer to the question "What if Lloyd was a girl?"~~
CHAPTER 1: In Which We Meet the Female Protagonist"Your heart is my piñata." —Chuck Palahniuk
"So this is it."
"Yup."
"This is what Jack's team has been working on for the past six years."
"Yup."
"And they're letting youtest it."
"Yup."
"...Aren't they worried it'll break?"
I rolled my eyes, and glared at my best friend from behind the TV. He was sitting on one of the bean bag chairs randomly placed around the den, with the the little grey and black box I had just brought over in his lap. He grinned at me, his dark green eyes sparkling with amusement.
"It's s'posed to be really sturdy." I answered, turning back to what I was doing. It was difficult locating the cords I needed, then connecting them to the right jacks when all the cords, cables and wires were tangled up in one big mess.
"That would be the best way to test sturdiness; hand the equipment to you," he said thoughtfully.
I huffed, frustrated with the cord I had just lost for the fifth time in the past five minutes. "How in the world do you deal with this, Kyle?" I asked in frustration, unplugging everything.
"I don't." He said simply, shrugging his shoulders. "You're the only one I know of brave enough to dig through all that."
"Then howdid it become this bad within the past three months?" I held up the big mess for emphasis.
He shrugged again, "I dunno." The doorbell rang and his eyes lit up, "Food's here!" He jumped up, dropped the box in the bean bag chair and was out of the room within a minute.
I sighed, resisting the urge to strangle him with the cords. It would ruin the wires and I wouldn't be able to test my uncle's latest masterpiece. That, and his parents were quite fond of him. They might just call the police on me. Would they convict me after they saw his shirt? Really. No one should be able to wear neon orange and green shirts and then sit on a pink bean bag chair. It assaults the eyes.
The smell of pizza and Chinese food wafted in from down the hall and I stopped thinking about killing my best friend. That would come after I devoured all his food.
I climbed out from behind the TV and dropped the big mess on the floor before reaching back and grabbing the ends that hadn't made it fully out. I sat down and started the ridiculously dull task of untangling the mess.
"Hey, I'm no Techie like you, but I'm pretty sure that those go behind the TV," Kyle set the boxes on the floor and sat down on the other side of the mess.
"I'm untangling them," I said as I set an HDMI cable aside. "Correction: We're untangling them," I added as an afterthought. If I was reorganizing his entertainment system, he was going helping me sort out the cords.
"Wha?" he asked, a piece of pizza halfway to his mouth. I reached over and guided his hand back to the pizza box and lightly shook it until he dropped the piece of pizza, and handed him a napkin.
"The faster we get these untangled and back in their places, the faster we can get started with the testing," I went back to the mess. "You do want to test it, don't you?"
He immediately reached for the closest cord. "Are you kidding? Be one of the first people to play a game in Virtual Reality?"
~~~ Sera, Jack ~~~
'Have you ever played Tales of Symphonia before?'
'In college. One of my classmates mentioned that it was her favorite game, and so I bought it for testing.'
'You mean because you liked her and wanted a common interest to talk about.'
'...''You know, for someone completely oblivious when it comes to flirting and innuendos, you certainly know quite a bit about reading into actions.'
'Some
guy did the same thing to me last week. I only knew about his motives
'cause his girlfriend got mad and started a fight.'
'Sera...'
'Hey,
that was when you changed your major, right? After playing Tales
of Symphonia?
How many times did you play it?'
'I
played it many times, and yes, that was when I changed my major, but
that is not what we're discussing now. You got in a fight?!''It
could hardly be called a fight. She slipped and fell into a puddle
when I side-stepped out of the way. What happened after, though,
might be closer to a fight, but I'm not entirely sure what you call
it when four angry high school girls try to tackle one...'
'Sera... Please don't tell me you-'
'Oh no, I didn't do anything. They all fell in the puddle as well.' ^_^
'...' *sigh*
~*~
A large pizza, three Chinese takeout boxes, and an hour later, I plugged the last cord in the last jack and wiggled out from behind the TV.
"There!" I said triumphantly as Kyle pushed the TV back into place.
I plugged in The Box, as I called it, and set it next to Kyle's Nintendo Chest. I reached for my backpack and pulled out a couple cords, a game case, and two VR Helmet thingies. They weren't that pretty to look at, but not much was expected from something still in its testing stage.
"So, does this equipment have a name?" Kyle asked as I plugged The Box into the Nintendo Chest.
"I dunno. I kinda stopped listening after Jack asked me to test something out for him. I just call it 'The Box.'"
"...Real creative there, Sera. What game are we playing?"
"Tales of Symphonia. An action RPG."
"Is it anything like Tales of Solaria?"
"Yeah, it's made by the same company," I handed one of the VR Helmets to him and entered the first game disc into the Nintendo Chest and turned it on. "Here, put this on."
"Aren't you testing it first?" he asked warily as he accepted the VR Helmet.
"It was designed so that multiple people could play it," I answered, putting my own VR Helmet on my head.
Kyle picked up the case and looked at the cover. "Hey, the chick with red hair looks kinda cool."
I looked over his shoulder at the cover, where he was pointing to a rather effeminate character with red hair, blue eyes and a round face. Zelos. "That's a dude," I left him staring open mouthed at the game cover while I turned everything to their proper settings.
I sat in my favorite black bean bag as the loading screen popped up on the blue/green visor. I heard Kyle sit on the bean bag chair next to mine, donning the VR Helmet himself.
"I take it you've played the game before?"
"Not really. Lia got to it first. I tried to watch but it's boring watching someone else play. I did get to play through the first dungeon though, and I did get to hear about her favorite characters." The title screen popped up in front of me. "Whoa!"
It was like it was really there, despite there being no background. The words just kind of floated in front of the TV a couple of feet off the ground. I reached out a hand to see if the words were actually there. My hand 'touched' the 'New Game' option (I didn't feel anything) and the title screen faded out while another screen faded in.
This time it was asking if I was playing multi-player or single. I reached out again and chose 'Multi-Player'.
"This is getting frustrating, Sera. Why can't I see a- Whoa!"
"What?" I asked, whipping my head around to look at Kyle. The floating words followed and now they floated over Kyle's head. The words were the same as before, only there was a small 'Waiting on Player 2...' just below them.
"It says I need to choose a character," Kyle explained.
"What're the options?" I asked. I was seriously interested in this. Did this mean that Zelos could be a part of the group from the beginning? Or that Kratos could stay with the group the entire time? Think of the possibilities!
"There's a kid with white hair and a blonde girl," he answered. "At least, I think it's a girl."
Only Genis and Colette? What about Lloyd and Raine? "Do you want to be a mage or... not?" I hesitated to classify Colette. I hardly knew her abilities, having always preferred the healer, mage and magic swordsman combo in my party. I always fought with Lloyd, not being able to stand how slowly anyone else moved.
"Not," he answered.
"Then the girl," I replied.
I saw him reach out to something in front of him and the resulting flash in my screen told me he had made his choice. I turned back to stare at the TV. The beginning animation was playing on it, but it quickly faded out. Er... my visor was fading to white, actually.
I don't remember the screen becoming pure white when I played.
"Once upon a time, there existed a giant tree that was the source of all mana," Kratos' voice came out of nowhere, startling me. "A war, however, caused this tree to wither away, and a hero's life was sacrificed in order to take its place. Grieving over the loss, the goddess disappeared unto the heavens," everything suddenly went black. "The goddess left the angels with the edict: 'You must wake me, for if I should sleep, the world shall be destroyed.' The angels bore the Chosen One, who headed towards the tower that reached up unto the heavens. And that marked the beginning of the regeneration of the world..."
I expected Raine to speak next, but nothing happened. I was left completely engulfed in darkness. I could no longer feel the bean bag under me, in fact, I couldn't tell whether I was sitting, standing, or even doing the Hokey Pokey. It was hard to tell anything when you could no longer feel your body.
Maybe The Box broke? I reached up to take the VR Helmet thing off, but I couldn't. My arms didn't move, no matter how much I willed them to.
I tried calling out, but I couldn't tell if my lips had moved, or if any sound had come out even if they had.
There! A discoloration in the black space! I focused on it as it grew from a tiny pinprick to something much taller than me. The shapeless blob slowly formed itself into the shape of a human, Fine lines were formed and I started to recognize it as color returned to the world.
It was Lloyd. He actually looked seventeen, instead of a kid who had just reached adolescence. His brown hair defied gravity as it normally did, I was examining his jacket with its overabundance of buttons when his eyes opened.
'Huh? Wha-What's goin' on?'He looked around in confusion, trying to figure it out. 'Where am I?'Then he saw me. Anger clouded his face and he started shouting. 'Who are you? Where have you taken me? Where's Colette and everyone else?'
Hey! Game characters weren't supposed to be aware of the player possessing them! What's going on?
'If you've hurt them, I'll...'he glared at me, reaching for his swords.
Wait, so he's allowed to move and I wasn't? That's so unfair! I want to move too!
"Lloyd Irving! Wake up!" Huh?
Lloyd suddenly rushed at me and I braced myself for impact.
"Lloyd!"
My eyes flew open when a chalk duster hit me square in the face. "Gyah!"
I staggered and my back hit the wall behind me. The buckets in my hands hit the wall as well, sloshing water all over my feet.
"...how do you manage to sleep standing?" the disgruntled person in front of me asked. Her light blue eyes reflected my confused face, oddly absent of the wisps of hair that stubbornly escaped any and all attempts to be swept back.
"Professor Raine?" I asked. Yeah, that was the Professor. She was the only person who could get away with wearing so much orange. I looked around me at all the students who were turned around in their seats to look at me. Hadn't they just gotten out of class when the game started? "Is class over?"
She sighed and turned away, walking back to the front of the class. Nearly everyone's head turned to follow her, a couple people still glanced back at me every now and then. Wow, she really had this class whipped into shape. Must have been her disciplinary skills. "Nevermind. Let's have someone else answer the question. How about you, Genis?"
...So class wasn't over?
Genis stood up at his seat near the front of the room. "Yes, Raine. Mithos, the hero, brought about the end of the Ancient War in the Holy Ground of Kharlan." Genis sat back down just as Raine reached the podium.
"Correct. Afterwards, Mithos, the hero, formed a pact with the Goddess Martel to seal away the Desians whom caused the war."
"But they've come back..." I meant to only say it to myself, but Raine's reaction meant that the entire class had heard it.
"We covered that in class last time, remember?"
No, Raine. I didn't. How in the world was I supposed to remember a class I never attended?
"When the Seal weakens the Desians reappear. Just like they have now."
"...I knew that," I said defensively. "I just... forgot."
Raine continued the lesson as if I had never butted in, "Today is the day of prophecy. It is a very important day, which the Chosen of Mana will receive an oracle from the Goddess Martel. Now, Chosen One... Colle."
...Colle? Not Colette?
"Uh.. yeah?" the blonde guy in the middle of the room hesitantly stood.
Hey! The Chosen is supposed to be a girl! Why is-Kyle! Did they make the Chosen male because the player was male? What about me?
I looked down at myself. Yup. Still a girl. That was nice.
"Tell us about the journey of world regeneration."
Kyle hesitated a bit before answering. "...It's a journey to seal the Desians. Upon passing the trials of the Goddess Martel, the Summon Spirits that protect the world awaken, and mana is restored."
Okay, how did he know all that? Had he played the game before? Was he holding out on me!?
"Correct. I suppose we should expect the Chosen himself to know the answer to that one," Raine said approvingly. Kyle sat down and Raine continued with her lecture. "Mana depletion is the cause of the current food shortages and droughts. It is said that this occurs because the Desians consume vast amounts of mana..."
'Hey!'Lloyd's voice, still angry mixed with a little bit of confusion, came out of nowhere and I nearly jumped. 'What's going on? Why am I back in the classroom?'Where was he? I swept the classroom with a glance and found no trace of the red clad swordsman.
'Why isn't my body moving?'Lloyd sounded frustrated.
Ugh. How long was this going to go on? Lloyd's voice was giving me a headache.
I decided that I had had enough when Lloyd started swearing.
'Shut up, Lloyd!'
My efforts were rewarded as peaceful silence filled my head once again. Who knew how annoying being schizophrenic could be?