Disclaimer:I don't own anything!
Author's Note: Inspired by The Princess Bride. Most tortuous class this year? Currently a tie between Advanced Algebra and Spanish for Spanish Speakers.
Decided to try and tackle solely the Yuan and Botta relationship. I'm probably gonna fail at the 'solely' part, but at least I'm trying.
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Friends can be said to "fall in like" with as profound a thud as romantic partners fall in love.
~Letty Cottin Pogrebin
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It had stopped being strange decades ago and it had only been strange in the first place because it had been so long since Yuan had had company that wasn't Kratos—which, even then, they had their own way of communicating and being around each other, so there really was no comparison. It didn't happen often either. Just, occasionally, Botta would find a book and read in Yuan's office, generally in the chairs in front of the desk, legs stretched out and comfortably slouched.
"I hadn't thought you would be so fond of adventure stories." Botta said once, running his fingers over the spines of the books on the shelves that Yuan liked to keep well-stocked.
Yuan smirked, leaning back in his chair. "What, did you think I was one for the romance novels that can be bought on street corners?"
Botta chuckled at the thought—Yuan liked seeing his second-in-command like this, relaxed in a way that the job didn't often allow. "That just seems impossible."
(In truth, it didn't. Botta has heard of Yuan's relationship with Martel, has seen the ring and has fit the pieces together. Yuan might have been a romantic once. But if he was, he is not that man any more)
Botta's fingers found a book with pages soft as feathers, they were so aged, and when he pulled the book out, the cover was warped and wrinkled from water. The title was in a language he didn't know, didn't even recognize. "What is this?"
Yuan glanced up from the paperwork that seemed to ever clutter his desk. "I've never read it." He replied honestly, surprised that the book was even on his shelf.
(But Yuan knows that, if Botta were to open the first page, he would find childishly neat letters on the inside cover and, even if he couldn't read what was there, Yuan could tell him what was written. A millennia old birthday wish and somehow, the book had ended up with him rather than with the man whose birthday present it had been)
If Botta thought that that was strange, he didn't comment on it. Something else that made Botta a good second-in-command—he didn't press where he didn't need to. Instead, all he did was replace the book on the shelf and find another one to curl up with.
They sit in comfortable silence for long hours, Yuan doing his paperwork and Botta with his book. The first time it happened, Yuan had asked him why he wasn't doing his own work and the other half-elf had simply said that he'd finished it already.
Yuan found it rather ironic that the second-in-command was more responsible than him, but he had lived too long to work that quickly when it wasn't an emergency anymore. He had endless days after this to look over and sign the papers. Why rush?
"Sometimes, I think the heroines are idiots." Botta said suddenly, looking at him over the top of the book.
Yuan glanced up, hand still writing because he hates leaving words unfinished. "What?"
"It was a thought." Botta tilted the book so the cover was visible and so that Yuan would have a frame of reference for what he was talking about before continuing. "Her love is in danger and she runs and, rather than pushing him out of the way or going for the man who's about to hurt him, she lets herself get hurt. It's idiotic."
Yuan smirked a little, eyes returning to the papers in front of him. (The heroine of their story died, but she wasn't an idiot. She just loved too much and too many and Yuan misses her so much that it aches still if he lingers over it too much) "You've been thinking about this for a while, haven't you?"
"It happens too often."
Botta had a soft spot for women, Yuan knew. Three younger sisters would do that to a man. He'd told Yuan once that his sisters were the kind of women with sharp tongues and strong backbones. Yuan had chuckled a little then and said that Botta was a feminist. And Botta hadn't disagreed.
"If it bothers you so much, write your own book and change things."
There was a strange glint in Botta's eyes. "Perhaps I will."
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"Sir, what're we going to do without Botta?"
Yuan flicked a glance at the Renegade—Dasin, he thought his name was. "Keep going."
"Sir, shouldn't he get a-a burial or something?" The Renegades didn't fear Yuan, but they respected him. He thought it was a good trade-off. Fear made people hide things. Respect got things done.
"You think you can find his body? Be my guest. I'm sure his dragons are still hanging around. Not to mention you'd have to dig through a small mountain of debris and corpses. Or he could have already floated out to sea."
"At least a ceremonial burial. A spreading of ashes, something." Dasin had a slight temper on him and Yuan only leaned back on his desk, arms crossed and eyes intent on him. "You know he deserves it."
"It's not a matter of deserving it. It's a matter of he died for the cause and the best thing we can do right now is get the job done. After the problem with Cruxis and the worlds," The word still sounded alien on Yuan's tongue, his mind still hardwired that there was just one world, the one he'd grown up in. "Is solved, I'd be more than happy to spread the ashes with you or light some incense."
Dasin looked like he was going to argue more, but one look at Yuan's expression had him backing down. "Yessir."
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The Renegades had gone home, could finally go home now that the Desians could no longer harm them and their families were free. They were all gone, save for a few that had returned after visiting their hometowns and said with a shrug and a bitterbroken smile that there wasn't anything for them there anymore.
Even so, it made for a very quiet base.
Kratos came by once. To tell him of his plans to leave with Derris-Kharlan. Yuan thought it was a moronic move, but he didn't tell him that. Not that he had to. Kratos knew Yuan's opinions better than he knew his own half the time.
Kratos ran his hands across the books and his hand stops at a familiar, dusty old book in a language that only they know anymore. He picked up almost reverently, cracking open the cover and lifting the edges of the pages. "You were the one who ended up with this. I thought it'd gotten lost."
Because when you lived as long as they did, things didn't get thrown away. They simply got lost somewhere in all the years. "I didn't know I had. Not until Botta found it."
"I haven't read this in…quite a while."
"I never have."
Kratos flicked a look at him. Not judging—that was never Kratos—with an understanding that Yuan had forgotten that he and Kratos used to have all the time.
It would have felt strange to read it. Kratos had read it to him, back when they were kids and before Yuan could read, by candle and moonlight, blankets wrapped around small shoulders. Yuan could recite the entire thing by memory, he'd heard it so many times. But every time he heard it, it was Kratos' voice. Sometimes, it was the quiet shyness of the child or the cracking and changing pitches of the teenager or the gentle cadence of the adult, but it was always Kratos.
"You take it." Yuan told him. "It's never going to get read here anyway."
"What will you do?" Do you want to come with me?
"…I don't know yet." No.
(They're living separate lives now. They're what nature intended them to be—two people walking their own paths—but in their case, walking their own paths tended to be so damn lonely)
Yuan smiled in remembrance. "Perhaps I'll write a book."
"About…everything?" Kratos asked.
"Maybe one day." Most likely not, they both know. Their knowledge of what had happened, both in the War and afterwards, should die with them. Whenever that might be. "One with a strong heroine."
Yuan saw the thoughts flash across Kratos' face, the memory of two women loved. Loved in different ways, certainly, but loved. "Oh really?"
"It was Botta's idea."
Kratos made a sound in his throat of understanding. "I won't be able to read it."
Yuan turned away, leaning his shoulder against the edge of the window. He'd wanted his office to have windows, despite the obvious security concerns it presented. He would've gone insane without some hint of the outside in here. "Well, I'm sure you can imagine it. It's the same old song and dance anyway."
"Not this time. This time, I think, things will be entirely different."
Yuan snorted, not in disbelief but at the irony. They'd come all this way and they were right back to where they started. With the birthday book by a window, with some kind of distant hope that, maybe, this time, they'd get it right.
"Maybe you're right."