Disclaimer: I don't own any of the rights to, or any of the characters from, Tales of Symphonia.
"All-right, I'm ready."
Lloyd Irving and Zelos Wilder stared at each other from across a grassy field encircled by a forest. Zelos drew Fafnir and sent it into a spin with flourish. "I'm just too pretty," he said turning his head and flipping his hair out of his eyes and behind his shoulder with his other hand, "Seriously!" he said glancing over at Lloyd. Lloyd rolled his eyes and said, "All-right, your pretty now let's fight!" and without another word he dashed forward at an incredible speed his magical boots a blur.
Zelos hummed leisurely and put his sword through some practice thrusts while Lloyd quickly approached, his hands on his twin swords Nebilim. Lloyd leaped forward as he neared and unsheathed his swords with a double slash aiming for Zelos's head. Zelos ducked underneath the blow and said, "Too slow!" coming up with a right-handed uppercut in Lloyd's face. Lloyd was thrown into the air by the force of the blow, but even as Zelos relaxed and prepared for his assault, Lloyd did a back-flip and yelled, "RISING FALCON!" streaking towards the ground in a red blur.
"Damn!" Zelos thought whipping his sword up in a defensive posture in an attempt to block the blow. No good, Lloyd blasted through his defense, knocking Zelos's sword arm out wide with his right sword, and following up with a left-sword uppercut. Zelos moved the back of his fist in the way and deflected the edge of Nebilim off his glove. With fire in his eyes, the Chosen now brought Fafnir to bear. Fafnir came across at neck-level and Nebilim was there to intercept it while Lloyd prepared his other blade for a counterattack. He felt his arm shudder under the strength of the Fafnir's blow and struggled to keep the shock from showing on his face. The last time his arm had shuddered from a blow like that was when facing Kratos Aurion. Zelos smiled with ferocity at Lloyd which unnerved him even more. Zelos withdrew his sword from the entanglement with Nebilim and yelled, "SUPER SONIC THRUST!" blasting forward faster than Lloyd's eyes could follow. Lloyd did a back-flip to avoid it as he saw Zelos prepare the attack, but now he was facing the wrong way with Zelos behind him. Out of instinct he brought his right Nebilim behind him to block the blow he felt coming. Zelos had struck with a two-handed overhead chop that would have cleaved Lloyd in two if Nebilim hadn't been there. Still he suffered a dislocated right shoulder.
Lloyd grunted in pain and did a diagonal forward roll, bearing all the weight on his left shoulder, and came up facing Zelos. Zelos was standing calmly with Fafnir held in one hand resting across his shoulders and Zelos's other arm draped casually over the blade. He cocked his head to the side and waited. Lloyd mouthed, "Thanks." As he reached over with his left arm to his right shoulder grabbed it and yanked hard, there was a loud pop as it went back into its socket. He grimaced but other then that made no indication that he felt pain. He stood up and looked through his eyebrows at Zelos and said, "Let's end this."
"Sounds good, loser buys dinner!" he responded rushing forward. Lloyd dashed over to meet him and yelled "SWORD RAIN BEAST!" unleashing a lightning fast series of thrusts followed by a blow with the strength of a pouncing tiger which left a fading mana-blue afterglow of the beast. Zelos kept his blade up and parried all of the fast blows and then dodged the final blow and came forward, but Lloyd smiled; after the Beast was finished he immediately transitioned to "Twin Tiger Blade!" an uppercut slash followed by a downward aerial slash back towards the ground then repeated. Zelos managed to get his sword up to block the first uppercut but it left his arm numb and the second blow knocked his sword-arm down low where it was unable to defend him. He tried to bring his glove up to protect him again, but Lloyd's next blow was too fast. He slammed the flat of Nebilim into the Chosen's jaw and sent him spiraling up into the air. Lloyd followed him up to smash him back down into the ground with the second return strike.
Zelos was ploughed into the ground face first and lay there a moment before rising slowly to his feet; while blood from a wound on his head slowly leaked out down his face. He regained his feet unsteadily then stood for a moment solidifying his stance. Without warning, he yelled "SUPER SONIC THRUST!" again but this time Lloyd couldn't avoid it. Instead he just caught Fafnir in a parry and was about to retaliate when he saw Zelos was smiling just as he had a moment before. Zelos transitioned from the thrust to a fluid combo of six strikes and then immediately to "LIGHTNING BLADE!" then "SUPER-LIGHTNING BLADE!" The first four blows had worked Lloyd's blades out wide and the next two connected, one on his shoulder and the other one on his side; both caused deep gashes. His two Lightning Blades thrust forward only to be parried by Lloyd's Nebilim blades. However, both hits still inflicted damage due to the lightning strike that accompanied each one and sent jolts of electricity up Lloyd's arms, numbing them.
Lloyd and Zelos both fell back panting as blood flowed from their respective wounds and they watched each other with wary respect. Once they had both caught their breath Zelos stood up and shouted "DEMON'S FANG!" the shockwave from his sword tearing up the earth on its path towards Lloyd. Lloyd blocked it and as soon as he lowered his sword he realized his folly. Zelos had followed the shockwave in its shadow and was now right upon Lloyd. He struck with an uppercut which Lloyd slid underneath with the same uppercut Zelos had used on him in the beginning of the fight. As Zelos flew through the air he did a back-flip and yelled "THUNDER BLADE!" instant casting using his ex-sphere. A huge blade of lightning dropped out of the sky onto Lloyd and blasted him with waves of electricity causing lights to dance in his eyes and almost knocking him unconscious.
As Zelos landed he ran back forward towards Lloyd intending to finish him off while he was dazed, but Lloyd jumped into the air and in the place of his twin blades their appeared the Eternal Sword. "Judgment has come." He said quietly "FALCON'S CREST!" there were shockwaves of holy power that blasted through the surrounding area engulfing him and Zelos and blasting holy power through Zelos's body. He then dropped out of the air to the ground smashing into the ground with the Eternal Sword and allowing the holy power to pulse through the ground into Zelos as well. With eyes closed he stood up and said, "Sorry Zelos, but I win." No one had ever lasted against the FALCON'S CREST, not even Mithos. There was no way Zelos could still be conscious.
"Don't get cocky squirt." said a voice right behind him and his eyes sprang wide with shock. Before he could do anything Zelos said, "Don't worry, this place will be your GRAVE!" The ground trembled with the shifting of the rocks and three pillars of rock came up diagonally from the ground crushing Lloyd between them and then receded to leave him crumpled unconscious on the ground. Zelos came over and knelt over Lloyd and said "HEALING STREAM!" and felt the mana flow into the air around them and restore all their wounds back to before they began the fight.
"If you thought that I didn't learn a thing or two from our fight with Mithos then you're sadly mistaken" he said to Lloyd's unconscious form. "Teleporting is a relatively simple move actually." He sat in silence for a few moments he healed the last of their wounds. "Hmm… it seems even your training with Regal didn't do you any good." he said thoughtfully before he heard behind him "MIRAGE!" and watched in astonishment as the Lloyd in front of him vanished. "Well played." Was the last thing he thought as he turned his head to see Lloyd approaching from above and behind him in the RISING FALCON position. He smashed the back of Zelos's head with the flat of his blade, rendering Zelos unconscious.
Lloyd stood over him with no small amount of satisfaction and pride seeping into his stance as he proudly proclaimed "HA! You buy dinner now!"