A/N: This was another 100 Themes challenge piece that ran away with me and got too long. One-shot. Enjoy and review.

Ash
PROMPT 80: Only Human
SUBJECT: Presea and Lloyd. Angsty but sorta happy. Not from a romantic angle, unless you really crane your neck. 1st person POV.
WC: 1,214

It is logical to assume that at one point I was a person, just as that person was killed by the machinations of Rodyle and Vharley. I was a little girl a very long time ago, but that little girl has aged considerably despite her body's refusal to move on. The little girl whose body I am trapped in ceased to exist the moment I brought my axe down on Rodyle's head, and my revenge was spent.

The others have been kind enough to overlook my stature, despite their misgivings. Genis has pointed out that I am closer in appearance to his age, and I do not mind his assumptions, although they are wrong. I am an adult. There are very few people who recognize this. Luckily, I have learned to be patient from Colette.

I admire Sylvarant's Chosen as an individual. She has a certain strength that I envy in my position, stuck as I am. She has the willpower to move on and forgive, which I was unable to do. She can look upon her perpetrators and feel nothing but pity, which I do not understand, but wish I possessed. I think it would be something, to be like her. I have told her before that if I could be like another person, it would be like her. She has taught me much through observation; I have learned how to smile, how to be kind, and how to be patient with others.

The last lesson was very important for me in dealing with some of the others who cannot help but think of me as a child. For some, I am twice their age. I realize now that they do not actively choose to disavow this knowledge, but simply forget from time to time, as I am deceptively small. I have learned not to mind; Genis' pestering and stuttering, while endearing in their own way have taught me that I am still a part of this broken world. They have kept me rooted to the world and connected to other people. Zelos' actions are somewhat similar in this, for me; while he has not treated me like a child since he discovered my real age, his actions have not deviated greatly from his previous behavioral patterns. There is a comfort in this certainty. I find his, and Genis' predictability to be refreshing. Few people are predictable enough to count on, and it is for fewer still that this is anything more than an annoyance.

It is strange that I have can count the number of friends I have on one hand. I do not count the others I have not mentioned amongst my friends, with the exception of Lloyd, not because I hold any particular dislike of them, but because I do not know them well. I could not hold onto my hate of Regal for long, after hearing Alicia's tale for myself. My hate was spent on Vharley and Rodyle, and now that they are dead I feel a blissful emptiness. It is better than being filled with hate. In my heart, I have taken a page from Colette's book and forgiven Regal; I have yet to bring the matter to his attention because no one could possibly hate Regal more than he hates himself.

It is Lloyd, above all others, who helped me reach these understandings. It is to him who I owe my current sanity. The lessons I have learned from the others pale in comparison to the things that I have learned, and lived, vicariously through Lloyd. He is an interesting dichotomy, forgiving but punishing, saving but condemning, proud but yielding. Before I became human again, I attributed this in my linear mind to his Dwarven upbringing. I told myself his oddities were a result of the environment he grew up in, so very different from my own.

Lloyd is very different. It is a good thing. He told me once of a man named Kvar, who was responsible for his mothers' death. It was as similar story to Alicia's and Regal's, so similar that the timing of this story could be no accident. I think he intended it as a comfort, but it was cold. More a wake-up call than anything. He told me that he would stop at nothing to help me achieve vengeance on my sister's behalf, because of what happened to his mother and father. It was curious: the heat in his eyes, the change in his demeanor, the sudden shadow that fell across his face. I had not seen anything like it before, even when Colette was kidnapped or when the Professor and Genis were taken away. I felt privileged at the time to see a side to him that few others did, and accepted his offer.

The emptiness I felt when the axe came down was strange. Lloyd told me he felt the same when Kvar died. He explained to me, using the words someone – I suspect Raine – had said to him once, that hate was a fire. It burned you from the inside, and every thought about the object of that hatred is just more fuel for the fire. It will fan its flames to others and consume you whole unless you find a way to spend it, or put it out. The emptiness of vengeance tasted a bit like ash in my mouth, so I accepted this explanation.

It is a curious thing, closure. It's not always fulfilling, so Lloyd says I must convince myself that I did the right thing, otherwise I will go mad. We cannot all forgive and forget like Colette, he says. I wonder. Lloyd's tale wasn't yet finished until he met his father, which was a shock to us all. I awoke in the middle of the night, the snores of my companions even louder than the shouting that came from outside. My feet made little din as I stepped outdoors, worried about the commotion.

I had never seen Lloyd quite so angry at someone, not even during his previous encounters with Kratos. I was worried, but I would support him regardless. I owed him that much. When it was over, when he had accepted the fact that it was Kratos, of all people, who was his estranged father, he was left with a disturbing calm. I asked him if he felt numb. He said the truth tasted like ash in his mouth. I sympathized, and was quietly amazed that he managed to feel at all anymore, what with all of his worries and passions and constant tirades on Cruxis. Feeling was new to me, but an everyday thing to him. He just said it was part of what being human was about. I still found that rather amazing.

But what amazed me most about Lloyd Irving was how in the face of everything, he still knew how to forgive. I supposed his hate had been spent, like mine. Despite, or in spite of everything he could still forgive his father. I would not have forgiven him, but I am not Lloyd. I know what he would say to this – he would shrug and say, 'it isn't your fault, Presea. You're only human.'

It is good, that I can still remember to be human sometimes.